


Not Elusive. Just Misunderstood.

by Hyevon



Category: ATEEZ (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst, Baby Park Jisung, Babysitter Kim Hongjoong, Fluff, Hongjoong is chaotic, Jisung is so cute I might cry, M/M, Seonghwa is Jisung’s Dad, Single Parent Park Seonghwa, Someone give Seonghwa a break, There might be more ships later, and confused, single parent seonghwa, soft
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-02
Updated: 2021-02-11
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:08:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 24,425
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27835804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hyevon/pseuds/Hyevon
Summary: There were two main points of attraction within the dinosaur class. One being the prospect of learning about the awesome giant ancient lizards, and the other being Park Seonghwa; the untouchable 3rd year.OrSeonghwa needs a Babysitter. Hongjoong somehow fills in that spot, and gets more attached than he though he would.
Relationships: Kim Hongjoong/Park Seonghwa
Comments: 32
Kudos: 202





	1. Dino Class

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! These updates will probably be slow. I also nearly cried every five minutes while writing this, so please enjoy :’)

Dinosaur class, surprisingly, was Hongjoong’s favorite class of the semester. 

He’d opted to take the class to knock out a general credit with a course that seemed to be easy enough. He half expected it to be a little boring, but the professor was surely an energetic one, with a love for dinosaurs greater than Hongjoong could love anything. 

Other students surely thought just as highly of the course as Hongjoong did, but not all for the same reasons. 

There were two main points of attraction within the dinosaur class. One being the prospect of learning about the awesome giant ancient lizards, and the other being Park Seonghwa; the untouchable 3rd year.

He was mysterious as he was handsome. And boy, was the man handsome. Gorgeous, in fact. Men and women alike had attempted to approach the upperclassman for a date, a number, or even just friendship, and every time he had declined and went on his way, completely unbothered. 

No one could quite pin down why the man was so resistant to any interactions. He never claimed to have a partner, but then again, he never claimed much about himself to begin with. Park Seonghwa was practically a walking anomaly. A dark haired cloud of intangible mist that no one could grasp within their hands.

Hongjoong was much more interested in the dinosaurs than the “tall dark and handsome” sitting in the front row. Needless to say, Hongjoong was the outlier of the class. He never tried to make contact with the aloof and abstract existence of Park Seonghwa. In fact, Hongjoong found himself holding down his laughter whenever the man turned yet another suitor down. Choosing to watch from the sides brought a lot more fulfillment than shooting a shot that he had no interest in taking. 

No, Kim Hongjoong did not share his class’s burning desire to figure out the elusive Park Seonghwa in the slightest.

The universe, having a sense of humor, played its hand in Hongjoong’s life one day during the closing of dinosaur class. He knew this, because despite being one of the only people that was not enthralled with a certain upperclassmen, he had been (un)fortunate enough to be paired with the man for the first and only group project. 

He could feel the stares directed at him. Glares, pouts, and jealous scowls dug into every part of his body. A laugh began to bubble inside of him, and he used all of his will power to keep it from escaping. With pursed lips and closed eyes, he exhaled through his nose and tilted his head. 

When he opened his eyes again, they were met with a gaze shot at him from across the room. Park Seonghwa, who barely bothered to initiate interaction with those around him, was staring at Hongjoong. He realized that he’d never made eye contact with the older before. 

Seonghwa’s stare was most definitely not what Hongjoong expected, not that he really knew what to expect. The gaze in his eyes was not nearly as ruthless and indifferent as people made him out to be. 

Hongjoong shrugged his backpack on and easily approached the upperclassmen. “Hello,” He greeted. He really just wanted to jump in and talk about the project, being an avid dinosaur lover, but he knew that skipping introductions was incredibly rude.

“Hello,” The man smiled. It wasn’t that rare of a sight, as he would always patiently listen with a polite smile on his face whenever someone was talking to him. When he declined whatever was offered, the smile turned sheepish and apologetic. 

This smile was no different. Polite. Cordial. Hongjoong couldn’t ask much more of the man. 

“Park Seonghwa,” He introduced himself. He didn’t need to, since everyone knew who he was… not that he knew that, though. 

Hongjoong gave his name right after, and finally got to talking about the project. “I’m pretty flexible, so we can do whatever is easiest for you.” He reassured.

That seemed to ease Seonghwa’s stress, which Hongjoong didn’t even realize was there until it was gone. The man sighed and ran a hand through his dark hair. “Thank you, that actually helps a lot.”

Helps? With what? _Busy schedule_ , Hongjoong concluded in his head. 

“I’m free tomorrow after four,” Seonghwa offered.

Hongjoong wracked his brain, and came up with no conflicts. “That works for me! Where do you want to meet?” 

Seonghwa paused, and fought internally with some unknown struggle. He squished his lips together and puffed his cheeks out while he thought. It looked rather juvenile to Hongjoong, but not necessarily in a bad way. This was the most expression he’d ever seen on the man’s face before, and it was rather interesting.

“Could we do it at my house?” Seonghwa timidly asked. 

Park Seonghwa? Timid? Hongjoong was finding out so many things within such a small span of time. 

“Sure, I’ll just need the address.” Hongjoong, always polite and considerate, accepted the invitation.

The upperclassmen nodded and pulled his phone out. After a quick exchange of cellphone numbers, which Hongjoong felt strangely honored to do, Seonghwa texted his home address to Hongjoong’s number.

And just like that, they had parted ways.

As soon as Hongjoong was well on his way down the hallway, he called up his friend, Mingi, to relay the ‘fated encounter’.

He was partnered with The Park Seonghwa, the man who evaded all contact with fellow human life up until this point. And better yet, he had been invited into Park Seonghwa’s home. Hongjoong was living the life most students could only dream of. 

The line connected. “ _Hello?_ ”

“Mingi! Hey, you’ll never guess what just happened.”

“ _You failed a quiz?_ ”

“No, God made me the favorite child.”

Seonghwa himself stayed back for a little longer to put away the rest of his things. He checked the clock on his phone as he pulled his bag onto his shoulder.

“Forty five minutes. That’ll leave me half an hour before work,” he muttered as he hightailed it out of the classroom. The drive to his apartment was only fifteen minutes from campus— ten when the traffic was light. Today was luckily one of those days. 

He took his backpack off his shoulder as he stepped into his home, and looked fondly over the living room where a set of wooden blocks sprawled across the floor. It was a mild mess compared to what Seonghwa had come home to before. 

“Bless your soul, Yunho.” He muttered to himself, before wondering where said man could be.

“I’m home!” He chimed to establish his presence, and turned to put his backpack on the back of a chair. 

A gasp rang from the open bedroom door, followed by another, much smaller gasp produced by much tinier lungs. 

“Who’s that?” The big voice asked, to which a smaller voice replied ‘appa?’. “Let’s go see!”

Seonghwa smiled as his tall friend padded into the front room, with the little body of the former’s son cradled in his arms. 

“Appa!” The young boy’s eyes sparkled with joy at the sight of his father. He held his arms out and made grabby hands for Seonghwa, nearly pushing himself out of Yunho’s arms.

Seonghwa stepped forward and took his son from his friend’s hold with a smile. “Hello, Jisungie!”

Jisung wrapped his little arms around his father’s neck and curled into him as far as he could go. 

Once the baby was settled in his arms, Seonghwa looked up to his friend. “Thank you for watching him, Yunho. How was he?”

“It’s no problem!” Yunho beamed, and reached a hand out to pet the little boy’s hair. “He was great, as usual. No tantrums or fusses. I think you might have the most well-behaved three-year-old in the world.”

True to Yunho’s words, Jisung sat quietly in his father’s arms, looking up at Yunho with bright eyes. “Yuyu,” his little hand landed on top of Yunho’s, and he beamed up at the man.

Yunho’s eyes widened and a smile grew on his face, and Seonghwa’s face matched. 

“That’s right, baby, that’s Uncle Yuyu!” Seonghwa nearly laughed with pride. “You’re so smart, my sweet boy!” He planted kisses of praise all over his little boy’s face, who giggled at the tickly affection.

“Appa no!!” He shrieked gleefully.

That was about as complex as Jisung’s sentences got. Much to Seonghwa’s distress, the child had been struggling with that milestone. Stringing together words into phrases that were more than two or three words long was a skill Jisung had yet to feat.

Using new vocabulary was also currently at a slow incline, as opposed to the rapid succession of words a few months ago. Jisung either was having a little stunt in communicative growth, or he simply chose not to speak as much as he was physically able to.

Seonghwa didn’t have the time, nor was he alarmed enough to take Jisung to a pediatrician. He definitely intended to bring it up during the next checkup, though. 

This little display of calling Yunho by a nickname showed that Jisung hadn’t in fact stopped his learning curve, which was a great relief to Seonghwa. 

“No, Appa no! Tickle!!”

“Does that tickle, Sungie?” Seonghwa grinned, ceasing fire. 

Jisung giggled again, and nodded up at his dad. His index finger made it up to his smiling open mouth and hooked itself right in right after Seonghwa looked away to talk to Yunho, who’d been standing there ecstatically. 

“Finally, Yeosang can shove it with the bragging.” Yunho laughed and pinched Jisung’s cheek “Uncle Sangie has been demoted!” 

Seonghwa looked down, and noticed Jisung’s sucking on his tiny finger.

“Ah ah, baby no,” he gently pulled the child’s hand away from his mouth. “No fingers in your mouth, remember?”

Jisung’s eyes glazed over as he looked up at his dad with the saddest expression Seonghwa had seen that week (last week Jisung tripped and scraped his knee on the sidewalk and sobbed himself to sleep in Seonghwa’s arms). A whimper puttered past his tiny pink lips, followed by another and the beginnings of a little cry.

“Oh, sweetheart,” Seonghwa’s heart clenched at the sight of his little boy so distraught.

“Where’s his binky?” Yunho asked, looking around for the pacifier that was usually clipped to the child’s shirt.

Seonghwa broke his gaze from his son to his friend. He bit his lip and bounced the sniffling toddler in his arms. “I’ve been trying to wean him off of it, but honestly, I’d prefer the binky to him putting his fingers in his mouth.”

Yunho chuckled as he opened one of the kitchen drawers and rummaged through. “Well he can’t have it forever. The longer you wait, the harder it’ll be to take it away.” He squinted, not seeing what he was looking for amongst the miscellaneous keys, pens, and the occasional toy. 

A sigh left Seonghwa as he came up behind the taller. “I know,” he immediately picked out the pacifier from behind an unopened pack of sticky notes as if it wasn’t hidden in plain sight as well as it was.

Yunho looked at Seonghwa like he had two heads for having found it so quickly, but Seonghwa was already turned around, running the pacifier under warm water.

“I just hate to see him sad.” The man held the binky to Jisung’s frowning pouty lips until the baby fit his mouth around it, eyes weepy. Seonghwa used his thumb to gently wipe the tears away.

“Well that’s normal, Hwa,” Yunho put his hand on the older’s shoulder, before seeing the time displayed above the stove and remembering the essay that was due that night.

Seonghwa thanked Yunho again, and saw the man out before plopping onto the couch with a content Jisung sitting in his lap and playing with the buttons on Seonghwa’ s shirt. 

He ran a hand through Jisung’s fine black hair and released yet another sigh. That caught the boy’s attention, and he looked up to his father with wide eyes and rosy cheeks.

“Appa sad?” The binky fell out of his mouth when he asked, and Seonghwa picked it up when the baby made no move to reclaim it. 

Seonghwa felt horrible hearing such a question. He never wanted Jisung to see him sad, or to think he was sad. “No, sweetie, I’m not sad.” He pet his son’s head.

“Appa happy?” 

He paused for a moment, before smiling gently. “Yes, Appa is happy. Because I—,” He stood, holding Jisung on his hip, “—get to spend time with you!”

Jisung gasped with such excitement that Seonghwa nearly had a heart attack. He smiled back at his little boy and laughed “That’s right! So what do you want to do now, baby?”

Jisung’s face dropped as he thought so very hard about what he wanted to do with his father now that he was asking. “Block!” A tiny finger jabbed down to the unattended mess on the floor. 

And so Seonghwa sat himself and his child down on the floor to play with the blocks, until they were abandoned when Jisung cried out for his favorite stuffed animal. As soon as Lele, a stuffed pastel blue T-Rex, was in Jisung’s arms, he lost his interest in his blocks and crawled into his father’s lap. 

“No more blocks, Sungie?” Seonghwa patted his son’s back gently.

“No more block.” The boy shook his head in confirmation. 

“Okay, baby. Can you clean the blocks up so we can find something else to do?”

Jisung thought about the proposition, and came to the conclusion that he wanted to make his papa happy by doing what he said. He nodded his head, and popped up to put the six wooden blocks back in the toy basket by the armchair. 

When it was all clean, the boy waddled back to Seonghwa, Lele still clutched tightly in his arms, and fell into his lap.

“Thank you, sweetheart,” the man hoisted his son up and hugged him to his chest. 

“Welcome,” Jisung’s little voice floated up to his father’s ears.

Seonghwa left a kiss on his head, then on his cheek, then he held him tighter until the boy laughed.

They opted to watch tv and cuddle, and Seonghwa didn’t even notice the time had passed so quickly until the front door was opening. 

Jisung stood on the cushion and leaned against the back of the couch to stand. “ ‘angie?”

“Is that Uncle Sangie?” Seonghwa patted his baby’s bum and looked over at Yeosang standing at the door. 

“Aish, so smart!” Yeosang disguised praise with exasperation, which had Jisung in a fit of giggles. 

“ ‘angie! Toon!” Jisung bounced and pointed to the tv. 

Yeosang blanked, then registered what the boy was saying. “Oh, cartoon! Can I watch with you?”

Jisung eagerly nodded, and set himself right in Yeosang’s lap the second he sat down next to Seonghwa. Yeosang wrapped his arms around the boy like it was second nature, and idly played with his hair.

For how shy and (albeit unintentionally) rough he was around people because of it, you would think that handling children wasn’t really Yeosang’s forte. 

You would be right. Children scared the living daylights out of Yeosang, but Park Jisung was different. He was there from day 1 with Jisung, helping Seonghwa whenever he could to raise the baby that neither really knew how to take care of initially. Seonghwa learned as Jisung grew, as did Yeosang. Yeosang could hardly call Jisung just any child at this point. 

“Thanks for coming, Yeo.” Seonghwa pulled his friend’s attention away from the screen to thank him. 

“Absolutely. I just finished my animation assignment, so I’ll be good for the rest of tonight.”

“Perfect. I’ll start looking for a babysitter tomorrow, I promise.”

Yeosang looked at him. “Hey, look, I don’t mind watching him.”

“But you have things to do. I can’t ask you to watch him every day. Yunho too. I’ll get a new sitter so we don’t have to keep juggling like this.”

Yeosang made no effort to fight him on it. He was right; they were both busy. He tilted his head. “Remind me what happened to Taeyong?”

“ ‘yong?” Jisung asked, but his eyes were still glued to the screen. Luckily, he wasn’t all that determined to investigate why on earth his dad and his uncle were talking about his babysitter, whom he had not seen in quite a while. 

“He got married and moved…” Seonghwa answered when he was sure Jisung wasn’t going to press any more questions.

Yeosang nodded good naturedly. “Ah, good for him.”

“I’m happy for him, but…” he looked down to Jisung.

“No yeah, I get it.”

They stayed in silence until Yeosang’s looked back at Seonghwa.

“Don’t you have work?”

“Oh, sh— Shoot.”


	2. Great Big Secret

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I got carried away... enjoy a long chapter 😬😂

To say Hongjoong was excited would be an inaccurate telling by his account. Hongjoong would rather currently describe himself as eager. Anticipating. Maybe even nervous. 

He’d texted with Seonghwa (yes, Park Seonghwa, Hongjoong still couldn’t believe it) about materials and supplies for the project, and took it upon himself to go buy whatever they didn’t already have. 

Now he was driving in his little car to the address Seonghwa had sent him. So many ideas of what kind of home Park Seonghwa had ran through his head. Was he rich? Did he live in a mansion? A nice suburban home? Maybe a frat house? The third-year student was so closed off and mysterious, Hongjoong had practically nothing to go off of in relation to what kind of life Seonghwa led. All he had was his imagination, which was running absolutely wild.

He was in the middle of imagining the possibility that Seonghwa was a Wattpad Bad Boy who thought himself higher than those around him, when his phone GPS politely told him that he had reached his destination.

Hongjoong parked and took a long look at the building in front of him. He didn’t get out yet, having arrived ten minutes early. He could afford to sit and stare at the drab little apartment complex he was parked at.

“Well, I can cross luxuriously rich off the list.” He muttered to himself as he analyzed the cheap stucco walls and overly-simplistic design of the complex. No one with money chose to live in places as cheap as this. Even the wealthy that wanted to live frugally. This was a definite sign that Park Seonghwa actually was not rich, contrary to how he dressed and held himself. The opposite in fact. Park Seonghwa might have been on the poorer side of the spectrum, which he definitely didn’t look or act like in the slightest.

With a face like his, Park Seonghwa could have been a prince for all Hongjoong knew. However, the man was far from royalty. He lived in a shabby apartment complex, which on its own was very humanizing.

Hongjoong saw a flash of raven hair pop up from behind a little silver van.

“Speak of the devil,” Hongjoong gaped at the sight of Park Seonghwa locking his oddly family-friendly vehicle. Hongjoong at least expected a sleek black car, or even a beat up motorcycle. Instead, it was a family van that Seonghwa stepped out of. 

That really put a dent in the bad-boy theory.

Hongjoong grabbed the bags from the passenger seat and kicked his door open. “Park Seonghwa!” He called across the lot. 

Seonghwa paused in the middle of the road and looked around for whoever called his name.

Hongjoong locked his car and waved to make himself known. Seonghwa’s eye caught him, and that polite smile from yesterday appeared again. Hongjoong jogged to the older man and greeted him.

“Have you been waiting long?” Seonghwa inquired as he led the other to one of the sub buildings.

“No,” Hongjoong shook his head, despite being behind Seonghwa. “I got here like two minutes ago.”

“Oh, that’s good,” Seonghwa kept it short and continued on.

Hongjoong was itching. He was very bothered by how intangible Seonghwa was. What kind of man was he? Hongjoong was positively itching to know, and Seonghwa’s vagueness was not helping one bit. Even the way he walked was unhelpful. He carried his weight in his chest and swayed as he stepped. It almost reminded Hongjoong of a shark.

Ah, the first bullet point on the list of Park Seonghwa; Shark Walker.

Hongjoong rolled his eyes at himself, which nearly made him bump into Seonghwa’s shoulder. The man had stopped right in front of a door and was fishing out his keys from his jeans pocket. Hongjoong noticed that they were still on the ground floor, and mentally added that to the Park Seonghwa List as the second bullet point. 

The door swung open, and a wave of shrill wailing blasted out of the apartment. Seonghwa darted into the entrance faster than lightning, while Hongjoong jumped and dropped the bags in his hand, startled by the noise. He quickly picked the bags back up and scurried in after Seonghwa. 

The apartment itself was nice, but Hongjoong couldn’t be concerned with analyzing Seonghwa’s living quarters when his eyes were glued to the man himself.

Seonghwa had made it into the living room, where Yunho was trying his absolute best to console a hysterical Jisung. He forgot completely about the guest who walked in behind him, and hurried to Yunho’s side. 

“What’s wrong?” He urgently pressed, a hand placed soothingly on the little boy’s back.

“I don’t know. He was fine ten minutes ago. He suddenly got really clingy, and kept asking for you, and I kept telling him you were on your way home. Then the screaming started and I couldn’t calm him down and well…” Yunho bounced Jisung before handing him off to his father. 

Seonghwa held the boy close to him, which already began to pacify the tantrum. Tears were still being shed, and screams just turned into sobs. “My sweet baby boy, why so sad?” His voice was so gentle it almost was drowned out by the crying.

“Appa gone!” Jisung cried, “Appa gone like ‘yong!”

“Oh Jisung,” Seonghwa coddled and cooed at his child. “Taeyong went away, but Appa will never leave you like that, okay?”

Yunho frowned at Jisung’s confession, but could do nothing more for the situation. He busied himself with cleaning the living room.

Hongjoong was standing against the wall by the front door, completely stunned. 

HIs mind was going a million miles a second, and then it would pause to buffer, before starting back up again. 

Seonghwa had a baby? Park Seonghwa was a Dad?

Not a bachelor bad-boy? Undercover super-spy? Anything? 

Park Seonghwa was a Dad?

Buffering.

But Park Seonghwa was not married?

Did Park Seonghwa adopt?

Or was he married and still had to adopt? Hongjoong had no idea who that tall fellow was anyway. Maybe that was Seonghwa’s spouse? It would make sense why he turned down any and all date offers.

Buffering.

But there was no ring on Park Seonghwa’s finger. Maybe the tall man was just his boyfriend, and they adopted a child. 

Why adopt without getting married? 

No no that couldn’t be it.

Or maybe that was it, don’t be close minded to any possibilities, Kim Hongjoong. 

Also, who was this ‘Yong’ that the kid was crying over? ‘Yong’ might have been crucial in understanding-

Right before Hongjoong had an actual meltdown, much like the toddler in Park Seonghwa’s arms, his name was called and he was snapped back into reality.

“Hongjoong, are you okay?”

His eyes finally focused and registered that Seonghwa was standing in front of him with a look of concern.

And that was the first genuine thing Park Seonghwa had ever said to Kim Hongjoong. 

Hongjoong cleared his throat, and looked down at the whimpering child that was suction cupped to his father as he cuddled a stuffed dinosaur. “Yeah, just caught off guard.”

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what’s gotten into him. He’s usually so quiet and happy…” 

“Oh, no don’t be sorry. Kids are like that sometimes, I totally understand.” Hongjoong started to feel bad. He didn’t want Seonghwa to feel apologetic for his own child. He pulled his lips into a small smile to show that everything was fine. “What’s his name?”

Seonghwa let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “Jisung,” the man smiled down at his son, who was now looking curiously up at Hongjoong with glassy eyes. 

“Hello, Jisung,” Hongjoong beamed as friendly as he could, and bent down to be eye-level with the child.

Seonghwa was holding his breath again. Jisung wasn’t known to be keen with strangers. It was one of the reasons why Seonghwa avoided sending him to daycare and instead went for babysitters. He didn’t know how his son would react to this, and prepared himself for more clinging and crying.

But instead of a scream, a tiny “Hello” made it past Jisung’s lips. Seonghwa gawked. Yunho nearly dropped the plate of uneaten snacks he was carrying into the kitchen, being equally as surprised.

Hongjoong didn’t know that Jisung wasn’t normally so open like this. He didn’t see Seonghwa’s expression, so he felt nothing of it.

“Who might this be?” He reached out and squished one of the dinosaur’s legs, and instead of pulling it away possessively, Jisung held it up to show it off.

“Lele, T-Rex!” Jisung proudly announced.

Seonghwa held his eyes shut and bit his lip, trying to contain how much love he felt for his adorable little boy. Also to keep himself from crying.

Hongjoong gasped dramatically and grinned. “Well hello, Lele the T-Rex!” His eyes flicked up to Seonghwa playfully.

Seonghwa smiled sheepishly at the younger and pet his son’s precious head. “He likes dinosaurs.”

“And Yuyu!” Jisung exclaimed immediately after, hugging Lele to his chest again.

Seonghwa chuckled. “Yes, and Yuyu.”

Hongjoong tilted his head, looking from the child back up to the man holding him. “Who’s Yuyu?”

“Ah, that’d be me.” The tall man hurried out of the kitchen and up to Hongjoong, hand outstretched with a smile. “Jung Yunho.”

Hongjoong noted the difference between Seonghwa and Yunho’s last name. Not married. 

“Kim Hongjoong,” He took Yunho’s hand and shook with a smile of his own, since the former’s was so contagious. “Are you…?” Hongjoong boldly began to ask, as his eyes darted between Seonghwa and the tall man beside him.

It was Seonghwa’s turn to tilt his head in confusion. “Are we what?”

Yunho picked up on what he meant, and laughed. Seonghwa was still confused until the taller one clarified for Hongjoong. “Oh, no, no, we’re just friends.”

Seonghwa chuckled lightly at that, and Jisung, who didn’t know what was happening but wanted to join the fun, giggled along. Hongjoong felt embarrassed, but deep down he knew he would’ve died if he didn’t ask. 

“Don’t feel bad, it makes sense you jumped to that end. I’m basically Jisung’s mom anyway.” Yunho patted Hongjoong on the shoulder before picking up the baby who was now chanting his name and making grabby hands for him.

Seonghwa scoffed. “If anyone’s going to count as Jisung’s mom, It’d be Yeosang. You’re more like the step-mom.”

Hongjoong laughed absently, but he wasn’t really paying attention to the bickering

That was a whole lot of information that Hongjoong just received. Or at least, it answered big questions he had. There was no mom in the picture as far as he knew, and no other spouse or significant other was mentioned. So Park Seonghwa was in fact single.

A whole line of more questions arose to these discoveries, all of which were way too personal for Hongjoong to ask or even silently pry about. So he forced himself to quiet the hunger for understanding the elusive Park Seonghwa. He had his basic bullet points anyway. He was just a poor single father. 

A poor single father who was paired with Hongjoong for a project. For dinosaur class!!

Hongjoong was suddenly excited again. “Oh, the project!” He lit up, and Seonghwa’s eyebrows raised in surprise. Hongjoong held up the bags in his hand and grinned.

Seonghwa stared, still surprised, and Hongjoong felt an odd prickly feeling of anxiety in his stomach.

The feeling was washed away the second Seonghwa started laughing. It was breathy and high-pitched, and his expression was almost a cringe. It was utterly unique and definitely didn’t fit the image of Park Seonghwa that walked alone on campus, and Hongjoong was absolutely thrilled by it. 

“You’re really excited about this,” Seonghwa said with a chuckle, still smiling with amusement.

Hongjoong flicked his hand out. “Pfft, it’s dinosaurs, of course I’m excited,” He stated as if it was obvious.

Seonghwa snorted and gestured for the younger to follow. If he didn’t look back to make sure he was following, Hongjoong might have never actually moved from his spot. He’d made a discovery like no other.

Forget single parenthood and the like. Park Seonghwa had the most enamoring laugh Hongjoong had ever come across. 

But he had no time to ruminate on it before he was jogging to catch up to the man. 

Neither had realized that Yunho had left for the living room as soon as he saw Hongjoong gawking at Seonghwa’s genuine laugh. He knew where he was needed and where he was not.

The two talked at the small dining table about their project. It was simple in the technicality of the actual assignment part. All they had to do was make a clade (think of it like a family tree) of all the dinosaurs they had learned about so far. Easy. 

Except, the professor wanted her students to get creative with it. Sidewalk chalk, paint on the side of a barn, written entirely in glitter, it was pretty free-range.

Seonghwa and Hongjoong spent the first twenty minutes writing out the clade and defining traits on a separate piece of paper. They had already decided on using a big poster board and puffy paint, which Hongjoong had already picked up from the store.

Hongjoong didn’t question when Seonghwa also brought out dino stickers and paper cutouts of the dinosaurs they needed. He was fathering a child, after all. Such things were a necessity in his house. 

Yunho plopped Jisung in Seonghwa’s lap right after that, having to leave and apologizing profusely for it. Seonghwa waved it off. He knew it was going to happen, so that’s why he’d asked Hongjoong to meet at his home.

Jisung wriggled back onto the floor and went to retrieve something from his room.

“Sorry, I’ll have to split my attention now,” Seonghwa sighed as he finished writing the title at the top of the poster.

“Don’t apologize. We already did the real work anyway, this is just the fun part you’re missing out on.” Hongjoong didn’t hesitate to tease with a cheeky shrug and matching smile.

“Hey,” Seonghwa reprimanded without really getting upset. He was actually smiling, but somehow it was also stern. Must come from the whole parent thing.

“Appa up?” 

Seonghwa looked down to his side, where Jisung was tugging on the hem of his sweater to get his attention. The man brought Jisung up to sit on his lap without a second thought, and Hongjoong watched in awe. It was weird seeing Elusive Park Seonghwa being a father so naturally. 

The little boy placed a book on the table and pushed it toward Hongjoong. It was a children’s book about dinosaurs. Go figure.

“Sleepy Dinosaurs?” Hongjoong read the title, and Seonghwa let out a little embarrassed laugh. 

“Sorry, he- really loves dinosaurs.” Seonghwa patted his son’s leg. “Baby, can you put the book away for now? You can show it to Hongjoong when we’re done, okay?”

Jisung sighed, which both adults found to be the most adorable thing ever, and nodded, coconut hair bobbing up and down with his head.

Hongjoong started to sketch out the clade in pencil while Seonghwa took scissors to the paper cutouts. Jisung played with his fingers silently.

“You know, it’s interesting that we’re doing an assignment for dino class when Jisung loves them so much.” Hongjoong piped up after a minute of silence.

Seonghwa hummed, face contorting into a cringe. “Would you believe me if I said I took the class because of him?”

“Oh, really!” Hongjoong glanced up at him as he shook out his cramping hand, before going over the sketched clade in sharpie.

The older nodded. “He likes to hear about all the dinosaurs I learn about. Right, love?” he bounced the boy in his lap to get his attention.

With bright eyes, Jisung gasped and nodded feverishly.

“What dinosaurs has Appa told you about?” Seonghwa began cutting the last paper dinosaur as he asked.

“Neck,” the boy stretched out his neck and pointed to it, then held his arms out wide. “Nose!”

Hongjoong was able to make the connection to what kind of dinosaur Jisung was talking about, solely because he really enjoyed learning about them himself. He chuckled, realizing that the boy was making those gestures to imitate a long neck and big nose. Seonghwa must’ve taught them to him, since they seemed rehearsed.

“Do you remember the name?” Seonghwa put the scissors down and put the paper dinosaur on the stack with the rest of them.

Jisung hummed. “Naeya.” He stated with confidence.

“Yes, the Macronaria!” Seonghwa smiled and ruffled the boy’s hair before placing a kiss there. “Good job, Jisung!”

“Pretty good pronunciation for only being two,” Hongjoong applauded.

Seonghwa looked up at the other. “Three, actually.”

Now, Hongjoong could have let himself get embarrassed and create an awkward tension, but no sir, he was not going to allow such a thing to happen in the home of Park Seonghwa. Especially not when they had an awesome project that was still only half way finished.

“Wow, So big already!” Hongjoong gaped, making Jisung giggle. Seonghwa smiled. Crisis averted. 

“Yeah, he’s just having problems with getting words out lately,” Seonghwa confided his honesty with a lopsided smile. 

Before Hongjoong could respond, Seonghwa’s hand moved with reflexes so fast that it was hard to believe the man was human.

“Oh no, baby, that’s for Appa’s school work, not playtime.” He gently took the paper dinosaur from the baby’s hand and pet his hair.

Jisung cocked his head back to look up at his dad. “I help?”

Seonghwa’s lips parted, but no words came out. He eyed Hongjoong from beneath his curtain of black hair, which made Hongjoong catch his breath as he stared back, not quite understanding what was happening in the older’s head.

Seonghwa bit his lip and looked back down Jisung. “Not right now, baby. Do you want to watch some tv?” He lifted the child off his lap to place him on the ground.

Jisung shook his head and waddled to the edge of the table, absolutely determined. With both hands holding the edge, he went on his tippy toes and peered over the papers littering the surface. One of his hands pointed at the stack of dinosaurs and his face scrunched into a pout. “Help!” He insisted.

“Jisung,” Seonghwa called sternly.

“I help!!”

Seonghwa was growing more distressed by the second. He didn’t want his son to have a tantrum in front of Hongjoong.

Hongjoong, meanwhile, decided to take a risk.

“Do you want to help me glue the dinosaurs to the paper, Jisung?”

The boy looked at Hongjoong, pout still present, and nodded. Seonghwa sat in his seat, completely stunned silent. He watched his son shuffle over to Hongjoong and make grabby hands for him.

“Can I?” Hongjoong asked Seonghwa, hands hesitating to reach down. 

Seonghwa looked between Hongjoong and the baby, and swallowed. “Y-yeah,” He didn’t mean to sound so reluctant, he was just not expecting Hongjoong to be so willing to work with Jisung’s stubbornness. 

Hongjoong smiled and finally picked the little boy up. Jisung made himself comfortable on his lap, and propped his elbows up on the table.

“Okay, Jisungie, I’ll put the glue on, and you can put the dinosaur on. Sound good?” Hongjoong took hold of the glue stick from the bag and slid the stack of dinosaurs closer to them. 

“Good!”

“Let’s get started, then!”

While Hongjoong and Jisung made good work gluing dinosaurs in their places on the clade, Seonghwa observed how easily his child, who was normally detrimentally shy, came out of his shell with a man he’d only met less than an hour ago. It was like how Jisung was with Yunho, or even Yeosang.

He wanted to say so many things, but all of it would sound incredibly awkward no matter how he worded it, so he kept his mouth shut.

Jisung was patient and so very gentle with each dinosaur as he pressed the paper against the glue. With careful hands, he made sure there were no wrinkles, and no corners left up.

His cheeks puffed out as he worked, and in that moment it struck Hongjoong that it was indeed Park Seonghwa’s child sitting on his lap. Jisung didn’t look an awful lot like his father, but it was uncanny the way they both puffed their cheeks out like that, and how they had stars in their eyes when looking at the subjects of their adoration. 

Only a few more papers remained when Hongjoong felt Jisung flinch, pulling him out of his thoughts.

“Ouch,” the boy lifted his hand up.

Seonghwa and Hongjoong both watched a little prick of red bead up on the near-invisible cut on Jisung’s finger. Then his lips quivered as they pulled into a frown. “A-appa, ouch,” the boy whimpered.

“Oh,” Hongjoong’s brows furrowed. 

Seonghwa jumped up and scooped his little boy into his arms. “I’ll get him a bandaid.”

“Okay,” Hongjoong knew he probably should finish gluing the dinosaurs, but his eyes were stuck on Park Seonghwa in ‘concerned parent mode’.

He pulled a box of bandaids out of a drawer in the kitchen and set Jisung down on the counter. After pulling a bandage out of the box and opening it up, he tossed the wrappings aside for the moment. “Let me see, sweetheart.”

The boy stuck his finger out, and sniffed. Seonghwa carefully wrapped the bandage around his baby’s finger, and kissed it better with a sweet smile.

“All better!” the man picked Jisung up again and hugged him close as he walked back toward the dining table. 

Hongjoong scrambled to make himself look busy. He did not want Park Seonghwa to know that he was staring.

Seonghwa watched Hongjoong hurriedly finish up with the paper cutouts, while he swayed with Jisung in his arms until the sniffles were all gone.

“What’s left?” Seonghwa asked, looking over the completed clade.

“Decoration!” Hongjoong grinned and pulled out a pack of markers. 

Seonghwa sat back down with a chuckle. “What did you have in mind?”

Hongjoong looked up, and his grin turned evil. “Meteors.”

A light laugh left Seonghwa, but he quieted when Jisung’s small voice spoke up.

“What was that, baby?”

“ ‘leepy Dino?” 

It was silent for a moment. 

“Yeah, I promised you, didn’t I?” Hongjoong picked the discarded book up and stood from the table. He didn’t promise, but it was all the same to Jisung. 

“Are you sure?” Seonghwa looked up at him. 

“As long as you can draw those meteors for me, I’ll be perfect,” He smiled.

Seonghwa shook his head with a chuckle as his son shimmied off of his lap. “Sure thing.”

Jisung, quite eagerly, tugged on Hongjoong’s pant leg and led him to the couch in the living room.

Once Seonghwa was sure they were okay, he turned his attention to the poster. He wasn’t the most artistic; that badge belonged to Yeosang and his major in digital art. But Seonghwa did his best to draw meteors on the poster. 

Every so often, he’d hear babbling or a giggle, and would look over his shoulder to see his classmate fawning over the book with his little boy. 

It truly was a spectacle, but it left Seonghwa’s heart warm regardless. 

“Poster’s done!” Seonghwa exclaimed, and Hongjoong celebrated from where he sat playing with Jisung and Lele the T-Rex. 

Jisung asked to be picked up, which shocked Hongjoong a little bit, but he just couldn’t say no to such a polite request.

He made it to the table with the baby on his hip, weary of what Seonghwa’s reaction might be. 

Said man didn’t seem particularly offended, and Hongjoong let himself breathe again. He inspected the poster right after, and his eyebrows jumped up.

“You added stars,” he side-eyed Seonghwa with a sly smirk.

Seonghwa shrunk into himself the slightest bit. “I-it looked a bit bare.”

Hongjoong giggled at how adorable Park Seonghwa could be. “It’s cute,” he grinned shamelessly.

“Thanks?” The raven haired man rubbed the back of his neck in uncertainty. “Do you want to keep it here? I can bring it in tomorrow.” 

After thinking to himself, Hongjoong shook his head. “No, it’s okay. I’ll bring it, no worries.”

He swerved the topic by insisting that Seonghwa keep all the remaining supplies for crafts with Jisung, which Seonghwa was incredibly grateful for.

Hongjoong did not disclose the fact of why he went through the extra trouble driving the poster home with him.

Kim Hongjoong was very well-known on campus for his bright personality. No one would bat an eye at him bringing in such a unique poster, when he chose to wear outfits that showed off his entire identity to school. 

Oh, but Park Seonghwa carrying a poster covered in dinosaurs, meteors, and stars into class? 

That would be revolutionary.

It would give him personality. Personality which would not quite match the reputation he’d cumulated. And everyone would be talking about the little glimpse of Park Seonghwa they’d seen. 

Hongjoong felt a deep desire to keep the life of the real Park Seonghwa a secret. And no matter how hard he tried, he could not possibly fathom why he felt this way. 

All he knew was that his Park Seonghwa List was definitely not making it to the public’s eye. 

Although, he was dying to tell someone about the information he discovered. He could have been rich if he was scummy enough to sell information.

Because it was _good_ information.

About _Park Seonghwa._

Mingi was a definite no. So was Wooyoung. And while he was at it, he might as well throw San in as well. None of them could keep secrets. Wooyoung loved gossip, San loved listening to Wooyoung, and Mingi was just a little oblivious when it came to secret keeping (bless his heart, he was too honest for his own good, despite how easily he lied about insignificant things). 

Jongho?

Jongho was a good bet. He was quiet anyway.

Then Hongjoong wondered if it was really any of his business to be talking about someone else’s private life.

The thought left him quite uncomfortable with the fact that he was just about to pull up Jongho’s contact to blabbermouth about his findings. 

No, it was not his place. 

So Kim Hongjoong would not talk about Park Seonghwa, or Park Jisung, or the galaxies they had hidden in their eyes. 

That would all be his great big secret.


	3. Late Night Encounter

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just got straight to point on this one🥲

Suppressing evil laughter was a skill Kim Hongjoong should’ve been given a gold medal for.

The second he stepped into class with the poster tucked secretively under his arm, he saw a wave of curiosity blaze across the students.

That was the project Park Seonghwa helped with. What did it look like? Did it have his pretty handwriting? Was he an artist? Was it color coded and organized?

That last one made Hongjoong snort, because the poster in question looked like absolute chaos in reality. 

Smugly, he sauntered to his usual seat and placed the poster down. It looked like a very Hongjoong inspired project, and it discouraged the prying eyes.

It made the most sense that Brooding Park Seonghwa probably did the dark lines of the clade, and glued down the dinosaur pictures (the easy and frankly quite boring part), while Boisterous Kim Hongjoong drew all the colorful decor around the edges and corners that really gave the poster its pizzazz.

What Hongjoong wouldn’t give to see their faces if they knew it was the other way around. 

The raven haired man shuffled into the classroom, and as always, all attention was on him. He never acknowledged the attention, always walking with headphones plugged into his head, and his vacant stare cast straight ahead. 

Save for the way he still walked like a shark, the way he held himself on campus was very unlike Seonghwa. The ‘real’ Seonghwa, anyway. The one whose unique laugh shot arrows through hearts.

Seonghwa looked up, and his eyes met with Hongjoong. He smiled, and the younger could tell it was real when the fatigue vanished from his eyes. His usual polite smiles didn’t do that.

That caught everyone — including Hongjoong — off guard. 

Instead of taking his seat upfront, Seonghwa sped over to where Hongjoong always sat, and took his headphones out. “Can I sit with you?”

“Yeah, sure.” Hongjoong replied casually and moved his backpack off the chair.

He was eating up the way some girls a few rows behind were gaping at them. He could feel another glare, and heard a frantic whisper come from elsewhere. 

Seeing the rise he was getting for something so meaningless was absolutely hilarious to him. The pure ridiculousness of these grown adults was the finest form of entertainment. 

Seonghwa was just glad not to be sitting alone anymore, and pulled out his phone to text Yunho. That alone made the air around him so much more warm and inviting. 

“How’s Jisung’s finger?” Hongjoong inquired, and internally winced when he realized how awkward it was to ask. It looked like he was grasping at straws, which he most definitely was not. 

“Hm?” Seonghwa looked up from his phone. “Oh, he’s okay. I changed the bandaid this morning and it’s already healing.”

“Oh, good!” Hongjoong relaxed at the lack of tension. Seonghwa really didn’t get offended often, Hongjoong was slowly realizing. 

The thought of his little boy made Seonghwa smile to himself. “He’s been talking about dinosaurs all morning. He even scribbled a picture for me before I left.” His reminiscent smile dropped suddenly, and the pads of his fingers covered his mouth as he turned to Hongjoong with wide eyes. “I’m oversharing… Sorry.”

Hongjoong blinked and shook his head. “No, it’s alright. I don’t mind hearing. He’s a cute boy.”

That seemed to calm Seonghwa’s nerves, and his expression took on gratitude.

Then the Professor called for everyone’s attention, and they both turned to the front. Hongjoong’s mind remained on the man beside him, though, because wow. 

Wow, Park Seonghwa was incredibly apologetic. For everything. Hongjoong had now witnessed him apologize for not only himself, but for things he couldn’t control as well, and worst of all, he had even apologized for his child. 

He glanced over to Seonghwa as he thought, and his eyes fell on the spacey look he had while he wrote in his notebook. Seonghwa’s handwriting was actually… not that pretty. Not by Hongjoong’s standard, anyway. His characters were small and angular, and closely emulated the precision of a printer. Technically it was perfect handwriting, but it was far from pretty.

Hongjoong’s handwriting was big, bubbly and round. That, to Hongjoong, was pretty handwriting. 

Yet he still found himself admiring Seonghwa’s writing as the man finished with the unit title. Then, the third year began to doodle in the corner of his notebook.

Hongjoong squinted at the margins of the lined paper, and noticed that all of the little scribbles were actually tiny stars.

 _Seonghwa and his stars_ Hongjoong thought.

He relished in every look he got as he walked to the professor to turn their poster in, and was rewarded with the smile Seonghwa gave him on his walk back.

At the end of class, Seonghwa waved goodbye to Hongjoong with a friendly chirp and ducked out of the lecture hall. 

Hongjoong wanted to leave as soon as possible, as he absolutely intended to dodge all of the other students’ questions, but alas he was cornered by his peers instantaneously. He took one last look at Seonghwa’s retreating figure as he received a call, and disappeared down the hall.

“What was he like?”

“Is he married?”

“Is he mean?”

Hongjoong stood up and slung his backpack over his shoulder with a charged swing and a bright smile. “He’s everything you've ever imagined.” he playfully looked up at the ceiling with an obnoxiously wistful drawl, hand pressing to his heart like he was remembering a tender memory in fondness. 

The group that had gathered collectively groaned, and dispersed as Hongjoong weaseled out of the crowd, zipping out of the building before he could be stopped again.

The news was out. Kim Hongjoong had made contact with the untouchable third year. 

“ _Hey, Hwa_ ,” Yeosang’s voice came through the line as soon as Seonghwa picked up.

“Hey, what do you need?”

Yeosang scoffed. “ _Can’t I call you just to check in?_ ”

“You can, but that doesn't mean you actually do.” He chuckled, and then heard a huff from the other side.

“ _Okay, you got me. I am kind of checking in though._ ”

“Oh?”

“ _Yeah. How’s finding a babysitter going for you?_ ”

Hwa almost tripped on his own feet. “Oh shoot,” he groaned.

“ _Uh huh, I thought so._ ”

“I’m so sorry, Yeo. I’ll start looking today, for real.”

“ _It’s okay, I’m not really bothered. I’m just worried. It’s the middle of the semester, and I won’t have all the time in the world to help with Jisung. Neither will Yunho._ ”

Seonghwa sighed.

“I know, I know. I’ll figure it out.”

Yeosang was silent for a moment. 

“ _I know you will. You always do. Just- … don’t stress yourself out, okay?_ ”

Seonghwa nodded and pursed his lips.

“Yeah. Thanks, Yeosang.”

A muffled “Appa!” woke him up with a jolt as it always did. Ever since he had Jisung, Seonghwa had become a light sleeper, sensitive to any and every noise that came from his son’s room.

He always had a thin veil of exhaustion throughout his days because of it. 

The clock on his bedside table read a little too close to midnight. Close enough to make Seonghwa sigh. It had only been an hour since he fell asleep.

After putting Jisung down, Seonghwa spent his time looking on many websites for possible babysitters, but none of them really gave him a good feeling. He went to bed frustrated and particularly discouraged, but now all he worried about was his son’s wailing.

He lifted himself out of bed and blinked away the sleep in his eyes as he trudged out of his room and into the one adjacent to his. “What’s wrong, sweetheart?” his hand rubbed against his forehead.

Jisung was standing in his crib with a frustrated pout, arms held out for his father. “Diaper!” he cried.

“Okay, baby, don’t get upset.” Seonghwa took Jisung out of the crib and carried him over to the diaper station up against the opposite wall. 

After cleaning up and discarding the soiled diaper, his hand blindly reached for the diaper basket to only find one left. Seonghwa’s brows furrowed as he stared at the last diaper in his hand. After blinking down at his patient son, he slipped the diaper onto him and pulled his pajama pants back on.

He looked in the cabinet under the station for an extra pack of diapers, but there was nothing there. They were officially out of diapers. Closing the cabinet, he stood up and sighed. Jisung tilted his head at his father, whose hands were on his hips as he thought. 

“Okay, Sungie, let’s go get you some more diapers.”

He fitted the little boy with some socks and little sneakers, then zipped him up in a little jacket over his pajamas. Jisung sat quietly as he watched his dad pull on his own jacket and shoes, stuff a wallet, and phone into the pocket of his sweatpants, and snatch the keys from off the counter. 

“Ready?” Seonghwa asked.

“Ah, Lele!” Jisung remembered, and waddled into his room. Seonghwa patiently waited, and his baby came toddling back in with the dinosaur safely clutched in his arms ten seconds later. 

“Ready!” He finally confirmed.

With that, Seonghwa carried Jisung out of the apartment with him, locked the door, and hurried out to the little silver van.

Jisung was quiet in his car seat, and Seonghwa curiously peeked through the rear view mirror to see his little baby’s head leaning against the side of his seat. The rock of the car lulled the boy back to sleep, and his face was squished so preciously that Seonghwa wished he could take a picture. 

Once they reached the supermarket, he definitely snapped a photo before hopping out and unbuckling his child from the car seat. 

Jisung woke up immediately, and grabbed onto Lele as he was being carried out of the car. Seonghwa made sure to lock the vehicle, and hurried into the store when he heard the old door locks make a SHUCK sound. 

Seonghwa darted to the exact aisle he usually did without grabbing a cart, and found his brand easily. 

“Should we get two?” He asked Jisung, but the boy’s attention was locked on something down the aisle. 

“Park Seonghwa?” A voice made him snap his head to the side.

Kim Hongjoong, dressed in the same eccentric outfit he was wearing during class, was frozen mid-step as he was passing. 

“Oh, hello,” Seonghwa barely managed to pull a smile onto his face.

His own hair was bed-tossed and he was in grey sweatpants (which made Hongjoong choke). His sleepy smile matched the tired glaze in his eyes, and Jisung looked even more tired as he sat secure on his father’s hip. 

The shorter was so completely enthralled by the sight of Park Seonghwa at a supermarket at midnight, he took a little too long to realize he’d been spoken to.

Seonghwa chuckled lightly. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“I might as well have,” Hongjoong muttered under his breath, eyes sweeping over Seonghwa’s apparent sleepwear one last time.

This Park Seonghwa…

This Park Seonghwa was incredibly attractive. 

And Hongjoong finally understood that Seonghwa was indeed deserving of attention, but all the attention he’d received so far from their classmates was for all of the wrong reasons. 

Because the real Park Seonghwa was so much more interesting than his reputation. 

Hongjoong cleared his throat and strolled up to the older with a smile. “I didn’t expect to see you… well anywhere, really.”

Seonghwa laughed at that, flashing his pretty teeth. “You’d be right not to. Not this late anyway, we just ran out of diapers.”

“Oh, I see.” Hongjoong nodded.

“Can you say hi to Hongjoong, sweetie?” Seonghwa bounced the boy in his arms. 

Jisung’s eyes tore from the bright packaging on the shelves, and found the brunet with as much excitement as a tired toddler could express. “Hi, Joong.”

Hongjoong smiled at how the boy said his name. “Hey, buddy! Are you so sleepy?” 

“No. Wi’ wake.” He shook his head sluggishly.

Seonghwa chuckled breathily. “‘Wide awake’, he says.”

A coo bubbled up in Hongjoong’s chest before shoving his hands in his pockets. “Need any help?”

“Oh, uh…” Seonghwa realized that he’d only be able to carry one package as long as Jisung was in his arms. He really should have grabbed a cart, despite not really liking them for their tendency to collect germs. 

_That means yes, he just doesn’t want to be rude._ Hongjoong already could tell by the hesitation in the older’s voice. He pointed to the brand he was standing in front of. “These?”

Seonghwa pressed his lips together, then gave in. “One to the left.”

“How many?”

“Two.”

Hongjoong hummed, and picked up two packages of diapers. “Is that it?”

Seonghwa nodded. “Thank you so much, Hongjoong.”

“It’s no problem!” He smiled. “Let’s go, then.”

He carried the packages to the nearest checkout lane, and the diapers in his arms were exchanged for one sleepy-but-fighting-it Jisung while Seonghwa paid. 

Seonghwa was a bit apprehensive about letting Hongjoong hold his child. Even though the man had already held and played with Jisung before, that was in the comfort and safety of his own home. In public, anyone could easily take his child and run.

But Jisung was whining to be held by Hongjoong, and his wriggling made paying difficult for Seonghwa. He could sense a nearing tantrum, which he was not too eager about dealing with at midnight, so he silently prayed for his son’s safety as he plopped him into Hongjoong’s arms to satiate the stubborn baby.

While Seonghwa stuffed the packages into some bags for ease of use, he secretly watched Hongjoong thoroughly engage and entertain his child with little more than animated conversation. The thought of needing a babysitter crossed his mind, and the more he saw Hongjoong with Jisung, the more that he seemed like a viable candidate. 

As soon as both bags were grasped in Seonghwa’s hand, Hongjoong graciously gave Jisung back to his father. The moment he was back on Seonghwa’s hip, the boy’s head fell against his dad’s shoulder and he was out like a light. 

Seonghwa’s mouth tempted to ask Hongjoong about babysitting, but his doubt held him back. He couldn’t do it. He settled for expressing his gratitude. “Thanks, again, for the help.”

“Any time,” a sweet smile melted onto Hongjoong’s face. 

Seonghwa leaned his cheek into his son’s hair. “I’ve gotta go put this guy back down. I’ll see you later?”

“Yeah. Bye!” Hongjoong waved as the older turned and left.

His eyes followed the man until Seonghwa was out of sight completely. Then he remembered why he was in the store to begin with.

He went to continue his quest for snacks, but unfortunately very nearly met an untimely death on his first step. He caught himself before he slipped and smacked his head on the floor, then lifted his foot off the culprit.

“Lele?” He asked out loud, when he recognized the pastel T-Rex on the market floor. Hongjoong quickly picked him up, and looked out the window to see Seonghwa’s car already gone. 

Realistically, he should have called Seonghwa, which would make the man turn his car around and drive back for his son’s favorite plushie. 

But then he thought of how tired the man looked, and decided he’d just leave a text saying he would drop Lele off tomorrow. He didn’t want to keep Seonghwa awake any longer. 

Honestly, it was the better choice. Seonghwa felt like if he was in the car five minutes longer, he’d have a very difficult time keeping his eyes open. 

Jisung didn’t wake up when he was lifted from his car seat and gently laid in his crib, which Seonghwa silently thanked the heavens for as he tiptoed out of the nursery.

As soon as his head hit the pillow, he knocked unconscious, tired enough to fall asleep quicker than he did earlier. The Park boys both slept through the rest of the night uninterrupted.

Everyone, say ‘thank you’ to Kim Hongjoong.

Seonghwa ran a hand through his hair, so stressed he could almost feel some hairs turn grey. 

He looked at Jisung playing at his feet on the floor of the living room, then back to the time displayed on his cellphone. 

11:56 AM.

Yeosang was taking a test, and Yunho was busy with his new internship. The bottom line was that he was unable to find a babysitter, which was all too ironic considering his conversation he had with Yeosang the day before.

It was getting closer to his shift for work, and he really didn’t want to take a vacation or sick day that he usually saved for days when he really needed it.

“Appa!” Jisung gasped and turned to face his dad, who was busy running a hand down his face. 

“Yes, baby?” He dropped his hand and blinked his eyes open, still mentally strained trying to figure out what to do.

“Lele!”

“Did you leave him in your crib?” He asked, only half present.

“Uhm,” the baby hummed and spaced out, thinking so hard to remember. He waddled off to his room to look, since his Appa was always good at finding lost things. 

Seonghwa sat in dread, looking down at his manager’s contact on his phone. He sighed.

“Appa!!” A cry arose from Jisung’s room, and increased in volume as he hurried with little stomps into the living room.

That pushed all of Seonghwa’s other thoughts away, and he clicked his phone off as his son threw himself onto his lap. 

“Lele gone!!” The boy’s eyes were wide with crestfallen panic. 

Then Seonghwa remembered Hongjoong’s text.

“It’s okay, sweetie, Lele is with Hongjoong. He’ll bring Lele back today, alright?”

Jisung was not satisfied with that answer, and tears still filled his eyes. 

“Come here, son,” Seonghwa stood, bringing his baby up with him.

Now he was panicking. 

Between his sobbing child and the shift that he was about to miss, he was losing his mind.

A knock at the door shook him, and kept him from hysterics. 

He looked through the peephole, and nearly threw open the door to see the solution to his problems in the form of a short brunet standing in his doorway with a familiar stuffed dinosaur tucked safely under his arm.

“Lele!” Jisung sobbed before either adult could say anything.

“Hey!- woah,” Hongjoong cut off his own friendly greeting. “Wrong time?”

“Perfect time, actually. Are you busy?”

“Uh, no? What’s up?” Hongjoong was ready to assist with anything the older was about to ask of him, which he kind of despised himself for. 

“I have work, and I can’t find anyone to watch Jisung,” Seonghwa started.

He didn’t even need to finish before Hongjoong spoke up. “I can watch him.”

“Are you positive?” Seonghwa never looked so serious as he stared Hongjoong down. “It’ll be until six o’clock tonight.”

The brunet nodded confidently. “Yeah, I just finished my last class for today.” 

“Alright, thank you so much, Hongjoong.” He opened the door, and hurriedly ushered the younger in. He handed his baby over to the brunet and gathered his things as he gave a quick rundown.

“He goes down for a nap at two, and likes to be read to before sleeping. You can also try singing a song, but if that doesn’t work then just let him stay up. Really I just need you to keep him safe and taken care of. There’s food in the fridge if either of you get hungry, and,” He turned back to face Hongjoong, “thank you so, so much.”

“It’s no problem at all!”

Seonghwa smiled gratefully at the younger. He left a quick kiss on Jisung’s head and then trudged toward the entrance. “I’ll pay you when I get back!”

Hongjoong wasn’t able to protest payment before the door closed, and he was left alone in Park Seonghwa’s home, holding Park Seonghwa’s crying son.


	4. Six Hours

What did Kim Hongjoong just get himself into?

He barely knew the man, and now he was in charge of Park Seonghwa’s son for six hours.

Six hours.

You see a guy in sweatpants _once_ for thirty seconds and then bam, you’re willing to take on babysitting his child.

For _six hours._

_Voluntarily._

“I must hate myself deep down,” Hongjoong stared at the closed door which Seonghwa had retreated through. 

A sniff from the little boy in his arms snapped him out of his trance.

“Oh!” He brought out the stuffed animal that was still under his arm and held it in front of Jisung with an optimistic grin. “Looking for this?”

Jisung’s face brightened. “Lele!” He grabbed the dinosaur and held him to his chest in a death grip. His nose and cheeks still were red and wet with tears, but at least the crying stopped.

When he buried his face into Hongjoong’s neck, the man almost physically melted. Now he got why Seonghwa always made such tight faces when Jisung was being cute. He was trying to hold himself together. 

Hongjoong was shielded from cuteness overload because of the sheer surprise he felt when Jisung curled into him so easily.

As nice as it was to know the baby felt safe enough with him to draw comfort from him, Hongjoong had no idea what to do next. He meandered over to the couch in the living room, and sat with Jisung still latched onto him. 

He decided to go over Seonghwa’s instructions again. 

“Nap at two, food in the fridge, don’t burn the house down. Got it.”

Hongjoong had babysat before, actually. Several times. His six-year-old nephew was the cutest boy, and looked exactly like his father, Hongjoong’s older brother. 

It wasn’t his first rodeo, so why was he so stumped when it came to Park Jisung?

For starters, Hongjoong was not related to him. Jisung was also significantly younger than his nephew, not to mention he seemed a lot more sensitive. 

Just then, the boy sat up and looked Hongjoong in the face, effectively shooing his nervous thoughts away.

“What’s up, bud?”

“Color?” his little lips had the slightest pout to them, still emotional from the trauma of losing Lele. His eyes, shiny with subsiding tears, drooped sadly as he asked.

Hongjoong almost got choked up just looking at him. Park Seonghwa was stronger than he looked, especially if he had to deal with such swells of emotion every day. 

Relief soon washed over him. Thank goodness children have no filter and tell you what they want when they want it. Most of the time, at least. 

Right now, Jisung wanted to color, and that was better than anything Hongjoong could’ve come up with.

“Alright, say no more!” 

Baby in tow, he marched into the dining room with a spark of energy that gave every step a little bounce. Off to grab the coloring supplies! Except he didn’t know where it would be.

His momentum was cut short when it occurred to him that he actually didn’t know where… well really anything was within the Park’s home. 

“Uh…” He sucked in his cheeks while he thought.

Jisung giggled and poked his sunken cheek. “Fishy!” His first ray of sunshine after his little mid-morning downpour. 

Hongjoong had to fight off a smile. He widened his eyes and made the biggest fishy face he could at Jisung. 

The boy held a hand over his mouth as he tried, and ultimately failed to contain his giggles. 

Lord this kid was too cute.

The urge to grin became too great, and Hongjoong beamed at the child’s reaction with a little laugh of his own.

He thought to himself for only a split second. And cunning was he in that split second.

“Jisung, do you know where the coloring stuff is?”

Hongjoong held his breath.

The time it took for Jisung to conjure a response was excruciating.

If his plan worked, Hongjoong’s job would be substantially easier. Not only would he know where the coloring supplies were, but it would be safe to say he could ask the toddler more questions if he needed to.

Sure enough, the boy raised a little finger, directed toward a cabinet above the counter in the kitchen. 

Hongjoong couldn’t celebrate just yet. He walked up to the cabinet and mentally crossed his fingers before swinging the cupboard open.

Lo and behold, there on the bottom shelf, was a small stack of coloring books and a pack of crayons, among an assortment of other playthings meant for a growing toddler. Hongjoong also picked out the things he’d left from the project sitting on the second shelf.

Now, Hongjoong could celebrate.

“Thank you very much, Jisung! You know, you’re pretty smart.” He sang praises as he gathered a coloring book and the pack of crayons all in one hand.

The boy shyly hid his face in Hongjoong’s neck, uttering the tiniest “ ‘ank you.”

“You’re so very welcome,” the man warmly replied, closing the cabinet and bringing the coloring supplies to the living room.

He sat on the floor, placing Jisung right next to him, and the coloring book in front of them both. Like clockwork, Jisung opened the books and flipped through page after page of colorful scribbles. Every few pages, there would be a little bit of coherent coloring drawn evenly inside the lines of the picture. No doubt Seonghwa’s doing. Or Yunho’s, come to think of it. One page in particular, which depicted a space scene with an astronaut and a cute little alien, had little five point stars drawn in orange around the other, rather bland stars inked in black. That was definitely Seonghwa. 

Jisung landed on a fine picture of life beneath the ocean. There was a dolphin, an octopus, a pirate’s treasure chest buried in sand in the corner, stray strings of floaty seaweed, and an abundance of bubbles. 

“Good choice,” Hongjoong commented, then looked to the boy to see him holding the pack of crayons. 

“Open, please,” He politely asked, doing his best to pronounce the L in ‘please’ as clearly as he could.

The brunet did so swiftly, and poured the well-loved wax crayons out onto the floor for ease of access.

Jisung wasted no time picking up the green crayon and coloring in the dolphin. Hongjoong watched the boy practice such gentle care as he colored, even though it only fruited in scribbles.

He must have zoned out, because suddenly the toddler was pushing a red crayon into his hand and pointing insistently at the treasure chest.

“You want me to color with you?”

“Mhm,” The boy hummed in affirmation, imitating what he’d always heard adults do when wanting to say yes without using words.

Hongjoong obliged, and took to carefully filling the jewels of the treasure chest in with the bright red color. Then he moved on to yellow, for the gold doubloons, and by the time he was done with that, Jisung had already deemed his green dolphin and brown octopus finished.

“Done!” the boy exclaimed, rolling the crayon back to the pile.

Hongjoong gasped, gaping openly at the scribbles. “Oh my goodness, they’re masterpieces!”

Jisung, who didn’t think much of his coloring before, looked back down to his art with new eyes. Hongjoong could see the little cogs in his head turning, as the boy processed the praise. 

“Are you by chance… an artist?” Hongjoong spoke in hushed tones, as if speaking about the world’s greatest secret.

The boy’s face turned back to him, at first confused. Then, a mix of joy and pride melted onto his little features, and he nodded definitively. “Yes! Like ‘angie!”

Hongjoong had no idea who “Angie” was, but he ruled it unimportant. “Exactly like angie,” he poked the boy's cheek.

They burned through a few more coloring pages, each of which Jisung essentially ordered Hongjoong to help him color. They spent a lot of time just coloring, which surprised Hongjoong.

Jisung must have had an innate sense of focus, because no three-year-old Hongjoong ever knew had an attention span as long as this one. A good hour sped past without them even realizing.

The boy closed the book back up and tried his best to put the crayons back in their box. He actually did a fairly good job, but the last one was giving him a difficult time.

Hongjoong stepped in to help before the toddler could accidentally snap the crayon in half. Jisung, proclaiming through broken speech how his Appa liked it to be clean, was busy putting both the book and the box on the coffee table, out of the way.

Hongjoong checked the time, and determined that there were 45 minutes left before Jisung had to be down for a nap.

“What now, hon?”

The pet name came out by accident. Who could resist, when the boy was as precious as he was? But was it really appropriate for Hongjoong to be calling his classmate’s son ‘hon’?

One time wasn’t awfully incriminating, so Hongjoong let it slide and labeled it as an honest mistake. 

Jisung, of course, saw no problem with it either way. 

“Ohmmm,” the boy’s eyes traveled around the room until they landed on the tv. “Toon!”

That one was easy to discern. “Cartoons it is!”

Although, Jisung only watched for about five minutes before entertaining himself with his beloved wooden blocks, stacking them into a tower and then deconstructing and lining them up like a wall.

He eventually grew tired of that as well, and climbed onto the couch and into Hongjoong’s lap, Lele accompanying him as always. 

Hongjoong caught the boy yawning, and one corner of his mouth quirked up at the cute scene.

“Tired?”

“No,” He said, despite the distant look in his eyes.

“Okay then,” Hongjoong pretended to brush the matter off. 

Children didn’t usually seem to get incredibly sleepy right before their midday naps, so Hongjoong hit the jackpot on this day. Putting the baby down would not be as difficult as it was to put his nephew down for a nap. All screams and thrashing.

As slick as he was cunning, The man stood up with Jisung cradled in his arms. When the boy protested, Hongjoong innocently explained that he was putting the coloring book away, and that was enough to pacify him.

As Hongjoong predicted, Jisung fell asleep to the bounce of his walking. 

The brunet tiptoed into the nursery, which was, thankfully, left wide open. He gently placed the child into the crib and stepped with light feet back into the living space.

He cleaned up as quietly as he could, and then evaluated the schedule of the day in his head. Nap, check. Food? Next on the list. 

The refrigerator wasn’t necessarily empty, but it definitely wasn’t as full as Hongjoong expected it to be.

Indeed, there was a tupperware of leftover noodles, and a few fruits as well. 

He decided to acquaint himself with the kitchen just a little bit for when he was going to make lunch. He found the silverware, plates, cups, and came across the miscellaneous drawer as well.

He eyed the pacifier in the drawer before closing it. It was good to know that Jisung still was using one. It could prove to be the solution if there was to be a meltdown later.

After getting the gist of the kitchen’s contents, he planned out a little meal using the whiteboard attached to the kitchen wall.

His phone vibrated in his pocket. 

He put the marker back in its place and whipped his cellphone out. 

Mingi was texting him, asking to hang out. 

Hongjoong sweated just a little bit. Was he supposed to lie? No, that was wrong. Tell the truth, that he was at Park Seonghwa’s house, watching his child? 

No, that would be catastrophic. Hongjoong’s big secret would no longer be his secret. He didn’t want to share this little slice of Park Seonghwa’s life he’d been lucky enough to be let into. Not yet.

He compromised, settling for a “Really busy rn, sorry”.

“Should I text Seonghwa?” He wondered as he kept his messages app open. “I’d text Tae if I was watching Iseul…”

That meant yes.

Hongjoong was ashamed of himself. It took him twenty minutes to construct five sentences explaining that yes, Jisung was now napping, no there had not been any tantrums, yes, the house was still intact. 

When he pressed send, he clicked his phone off and placed it faced down onto the couch cushion beside him. He felt like he was back in high school.

“This is officially dumb.” He scolded himself and his behavior.

His phone buzzed. He scrambled to pick it up, and Seonghwa’s name flashed across the screen in a text notification. 

_“Thanks for watching him :)”_

The next bullet point on the List of Park Seonghwa was dedicated entirely to the fact that the man used the old keyboard emoji faces instead of the new ones. 

Hongjoong was so wrapped up in Park Jisung’s gravity that he had forgotten just whose house he was in. Park Seonghwa lived here. He came home after long days and fell onto this very couch. He ate dinner at the dining table, cooked in the kitchen, and cleaned after himself. 

That was all very humanizing to think about.

Park Seonghwa was also just… Seonghwa. Seonghwa the single dad.

Seonghwa the _hot_ single dad.

Hongjoong smacked himself right in the forehead as punishment for having such a thought. He might as well have been insulting the man in his own home.

“No, you will not be peer pressured into pining. You’re bigger than that, Kim Hongjoong.” He scolded in a whisper.

“Pull yourself together.”


	5. Presents

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seonghwa doesn’t deserve Hongjoong’s good graces. At least, that’s what he thinks.

Seonghwa really didn’t want to be that parent.

The one that calls every ten minutes to check on their kids, unable to focus on the task that required them to find a babysitter in the first place. 

But Seonghwa wouldn’t be calling to check up on Jisung as much as he would be calling to check up on Hongjoong. He’d left in a hurry, and kind of shoved his son onto his classmate, who was proving to be way too nice. 

It almost made Seonghwa feel a little guilty, like he was taking advantage of Hongjoong’s kind nature. He’d always admired that about Hongjoong, actually.

Seonghwa was selectively observant, and the vibrant Kim Hongjoong was one of the subjects that he noticed more often than other things. The shorter was always bright and flashed with color, kind and selfless between his bouts of sass and sarcasm. He was like a fairy. 

There was an incredible wave of relief when Seonghwa was paired with Hongjoong of all people for the dino project. The others in that class just stressed him out, for reasons he couldn’t quite discern. Again, he was selectively observant. 

Hongjoong didn’t make him feel nervous, which could be either good or bad, considering he let himself over share with the other a little too easily.

He quite liked Hongjoong more than his other classmates, and was beginning to grow rather fond of him. The last thing Seonghwa wanted to do was scare him off with this little impromptu favor.

He told himself he wouldn’t call during work, and he was proud to say he only checked his phone once to respond to Hongjoong.

But once his shift was nearing its end, the real battle began. One that he was inevitably losing. “I’ll just… let him know I’m done. Yeah. That’s completely fine and not overbearing at all.” He reasoned with himself as he finished up sweeping behind the counter.

“You don’t sound very convinced,” Keonhee sang from his spot at the register, scratching at a little scuff on the side of the contraption. 

Snapping out of his own thoughts, Seonghwa jolted and tightened his grip on the broom.

Keonhee snorted at the jump, trying his hardest to keep his laughter in. “Sorry, didn’t think I’d scare you.”

Seonghwa relaxed. “It’s okay,” He dismissed as he propped the broom against the back wall and dumped the dustpan into the industrial garbage can behind the counter. 

“Find a new babysitter?” Keonhee asked over his shoulder.

The raven haired man tilted his head. “How’d you know?”

“Yunho told me about Taeyong,” the other filled in the gaps of his story. 

Ah. Seonghwa guessed that was fair. Keonhee was one of Yunho’s only friends. Well— one of Yunho’s other only friends. Seonghwa belonged on that list. Yeosang too.

Keonhee was also one of the few that knew about Jisung. One of the select few Seonghwa had let close enough to himself to open up to, even a little bit. By no means was Keonhee his best friend, (heaven forbid Yeosang ever be replaced, and then actually find out about it, because blood would be spilt), but he did know more than your average acquaintance.

“Oh. Yeah,” Seonghwa admitted, clicking the empty dustpan to the base of the broom handle. “I kinda… roped him into it last second.”

Keonhee’s face pulled into a grimace, softened with unmistakable pity. He didn’t know the details, but it was no secret—at least to the little group that surrounded him—that Seonghwa was a little tight on money, and needed every hour he could get. Between paying for bills, his toddler, and school, Seonghwa was caught between a rock and approximately eighteen hard places.

Pity made Seonghwa feel helpless, but he couldn’t be mad when he received it. It was a little sucky, he had to admit, the circumstances in which he had to settle and raise his son with far less than he wanted to give him. 

He needed the hours. So of course, he jumped at the opportunity when there was a chance that he wouldn’t have to use a vacation day. That chance had been a 5’7 miracle sent straight from heaven, named Kim Hongjoong. 

“I should call him after I’m done, actually.” Seonghwa put the broom back in its place in the closet, and patted his apron down. 

Keonhee watched for a moment. “You can go, I can handle it here.”

Seonghwa’s head popped up to look at him. “Are you sure?”

“Yeah,” He shifted his weight onto one foot. “Woong will be here in a little bit, and there aren’t a lot of customers today anyway.” 

It was true, there were only two customers sat down in the cafe. 

An exhale escaped Seonghwa’s lungs, as his fingers fumbled to untie the apron’s knot done around his back. “You’re a Saint, you know that?”

Keonhee’s smile, which was usually good natured, was now resting smugly on his face. “I know,” he shrugged and returned to scratching the scuff on the side of the register.

Three minutes later, Seonghwa offered a wave on his way out, and pressed his ringing phone to his ear. 

_“Hello?”_ Hongjoong’s voice sounded so much softer on the phone.

“Hey, Hongjoong,” Seonghwa chirped. “I just got off. How are things?”

Hongjoong was silent on the other side of the line for a millisecond, before bursting with as much energy as expected from the spritely man. _“Great! Jisung slept for two hours, we ate lunch, and then just played for forever. I just started him on a little craft project. I think you’ll love it.”_ Excited sounds from said three-year-echoed in the background.

“That’s-,“ Seonghwa felt a smile bubble onto his face, and gratitude flooded his chest. His baby was happy. “You’re amazing, Hongjoong.”

_“Yeah, I- oh,”_ the air got stuck in Hongjoong’s throat. 

Seonghwa chuckled, a little because of the other’s choked reaction, and a little from embarrassment. He did jump the gun on his thanking. “Sorry, did I overstep?”

_“No, no, not at all,”_ Hongjoong sounded winded. _“Just didn’t expect it, is all.”_

The line fell silent from both ends. Seonghwa didn’t even notice, he just maintained that smile as he heaved his car door open.

“Okay, well I’m on my way home now. It’ll be about ten minutes before I get there.” He started the car, but made no move to back out yet.

_“Perfect!”_ Hongjoong bounced back from whatever he stumbled over earlier. _“I’ll see you when you get here.”_

Seonghwa heard little babbling from the other end of the connection, and grinned down at the steering wheel when he heard Hongjoong give his son praise for whatever he was doing.

“Alright, sounds good,” he said. “Bye.”

_“Bye bye!”_

The line clicked off, and Hongjoong’s contact page returned to the screen.

Seonghwa tossed his phone into a cup holder and backed out of the parking space. He couldn’t wait to get home. 

“Appa!” Jisung squealed when the door opened. 

The boy flew from the dining room to the front entrance, and Seonghwa squatted to catch him in a hug. Little arms flung themselves around his neck and a tiny face pressed into his collarbone.

“Hello, my love!” Seonghwa squeezed his son tightly, gathered him up in his arms, and stood just as Hongjoong wandered in. “How did it go?”

“He was calling for you when he woke up from his nap, but I was able to distract him by reading his Sleepy Dinosaurs book. Other than that, it was pretty easy breezy. You know the rest.” Hongjoong shoved his hands into his back pockets, casually shifting his weight as he reported back to Seonghwa.

The brunet then patted Jisung’s back, and the boy turned to him with patient eyes. 

“Hey Jisungie, wanna give Appa his present?”

Seonghwa’s flattered-and-confused chuckle went unnoticed when the boy in his arms bounced with a loud “Ah! Present!”

Jisung pointed in the direction of the dining room, where Hongjoong was already headed. When Seonghwa crossed the threshold of the doorway, Jisung’s little hands flew up to cover his father’s eyes. “Close,” he insisted.

With a laugh, Seonghwa closed his eyes as ordered. 

He heard Hongjoong whispering to the boy, who would in turn babble back at the same volume.

“Open!” Jisung exclaimed in excitement. 

Seonghwa blinked open his eyes.

Clenched in Jisung’s tiny fist that he held up in offering was a string bracelet, decorated with many colorful beads. The ends were tied up to make the bracelet adjustable and actually wearable. 

“For you!” Jisung looked so proud of himself.

And standing right behind the boy was a beaming Kim Hongjoong. The Saint of the day. 

His heart felt so full it was beginning to break. 

Seonghwa didn’t know exactly what did him in, but something inside of him snapped, and tears welled in his eyes. 

Hongjoong’s face fell. He surely wasn’t expecting that. 

Jisung gasped, and put a hand on either side of his father’s face. “No sad, Appa!” The boy was upset by his father’s tears, and started to produce his own.

“Oh no, baby, Appa’s not sad. Appa’s happy.” He used the back of his wrist to dab away the tears, a weak smile flashing his pretty teeth. 

“Happy?” Jisung’s lip quivered.

“Yes,” he laughed through his little cry, and planted a kiss on Jisung’s head before taking the bracelet carefully into his hand. “Your gift made me very happy. It’s beautiful, thank you.”

Hearing that Seonghwa was actually happy did wonders for Jisung’s mood. Although his eyes were a little dewy, his expression lifted.

“Here’s I’ll help you put it on,” Hongjoong offered, and took the bracelet from the other just to slide it over his hand.

“Sorry for the tears,” Seonghwa sheepishly muttered while Hongjoong fiddled with the knots of the bracelet to tighten it. Seonghwa really couldn’t explain why the waterworks were in effect, so he didn’t try to give an excuse to his classmate.

“Don’t worry about it,” Hongjoong smiled softly, as he finished and stepped back.

Jisung gasped a second time, hands squishing onto his flushed cheeks. “Appa pretty!”

Both adults laughed, and Jisung was beyond elated to have caused it. 

“Thank you, baby,” Seonghwa patted his son’s hair down. 

“He’s got a point,” Hongjoong chuckled.

Then he cut himself off mid laugh, only mildly horrified that his lack of filter had allowed such an insinuation to leave his mouth. Calling Seonghwa cute for drawing stars on a paper was one thing. Calling the man straight up pretty because he simply was in fact pretty was something completely different, and in Hongjoong’s book, forbidden.

He braced himself to run out of that house as fast as possible, expecting there to be backlash.

But Seonghwa just blinked and smiled… bashfully. 

“Thanks?” He seemed unsure of the intention of the compliment, but he clearly was flattered nonetheless. 

It wasn’t bad enough for Hongjoong to flee in that moment, but it was enough for him to clear his throat and declare that he was cleaning up.

Thankfully, Seonghwa hopped on board, leaving the awkward air to fall away. 

Jisung made himself comfortable on the couch, watching his Appa and Joongie clean the remnant of their crafting on the dining table. 

When Hongjoong was busy scooping stray beads back into the bucket, Seonghwa spotted another string with assorted beads laying on the table. 

Curiosity prompted him to pick it up, and a light gasp left his mouth. The pattern alternated between little yellow stars beads and light blue circular beads.

“Hm?” The sound caught the younger’s attention, and he deflated upon figuring out what cause it. “Oh.”

“Did you make this?” Seonghwa looked over to the shriveling man. 

Reluctantly, Hongjoong nodded. “Jisung wanted me to make one too, and since he was making a present for you…” he didn’t know how to end his thought without being incredibly awkward, so he let it kind of just die in his throat. “You can just—throw it away.”

Hongjoong really didn’t care all too much for it, and truth be told, he'd be glad to be rid of it. He felt like he was caught with his hand in a cookie jar and it was all that bracelet’s fault.

“No, I like it.”

Oh. Hongjoong almost folded when Seonghwa spoke.

“Can I keep it?” 

Oh boy, how to words? Hongjoong no know. Understand not. Brain? Gone.

Autopilot kicked into gear before he crashed.

“Well it was made for you, so it’d make sense if you did.” Hongjoong shrugged, still malfunctioning on the inside.

“Cool,” Seonghwa looked back down to the bracelet and carefully slid it into his pocket like it was just as precious as Jisung’s, which hung prettily on his wrist. “Also,” he continued with tidying the little mess as he spoke. 

“Thank you. For watching him.”

Hongjoong’s consciousness returned, and his withering bones revitalized. “It was no problem at all.”

Seonghwa found he had a hard time taking his word for it. Why? It was just a dismissal response, so why was he so hung up on it?

_It was no problem._

Was it really no problem?

The more he thought about it, the more he felt like nothing short of a burden. He clamped that thought shut while entertaining Hongjoong for the rest of his stay while they cleaned.

And even after Hongjoong had left, Seonghwa was weighed down by that feeling. It wasn’t a new feeling. It was all too familiar.

He carried it through dinner and all the way up until bedtime. Jisung crawled into bed with him, and he made no effort to take the boy to his own room.

Actually, he held his child to his chest until the little one’s breathing evened out into short huffs, and his fists that held tightly onto Seonghwa’s shirt loosened. 

In the dark and quiet of his room, Seonghwa was being eaten alive. 

He felt grossly inadequate.

The pressure of Jisung’s bracelet on his wrist was heavy. 

It was a gift from the purest soul Seonghwa had ever known, and Seonghwa had nothing to give back. No gifts, no fun outings, no vacations.

He didn’t even have enough time to give. 

His eyes were wet with frustration. There was no greater disappointment he felt than that which was directed at himself. It was nothing new.

_“My sweet boy I’m so sorry.”_

He whispered into the hair of his sleeping child, running a hand up and down the boy’s back. 

_“You deserve so much more.”_


	6. Parasites

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hongjoong didn’t have friends. He had parasites.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No beta guys let’s see how many spelling errors I got away with this time 💀💀

Hongjoong felt something was off with Seonghwa when he left, but he wasn’t close enough with the man to feel comfortable asking. So he shoved it away and decided not to worry about it. It was out of his control and not really his business. 

He managed to sneak away before Seonghwa could remember he intended to pay Hongjoong for babysitting. That was a win in Hongjoong’s book.

His phone buzzed as he walked to the parking lot, effectively zoning his brain back in. 

“Aish, so needy,” Hongjoong knew exactly who it was, and when he looked at the device for conformation, he just scoffed and shoved it back into his pocket. He didn’t need to text back when he was on his way home anyway. 

The trip went by quickly. Too quickly. Unfortunately quickly. 

He really wished he’d spent more time appreciating the quiet of his car, as he unlocked his front door.

The second he stepped into his dorm, there was a storm of footsteps, and a screech that made his hair stand on end. 

He should’ve run.

But it was too late. 

“KIM HONGJOONG ARE YOU SCREWING THE CAMPUS BAD BOY?!”

The godly wrath of Song Mingi had fallen upon him. 

“NO? HE’S NOT A BAD BOY, EITHER??” Hongjoong screamed back, but in fear as the taller loomed over him. 

“YOU SOUND LIKE A REBELLIOUS TEENAGE GIRL TRYING TO CONVINCE HER DAD TO ACCEPT HER BIKER BOYFRIEND.” An index finger was shoved into Hongjoongs face in accusation. 

“HE DOESN'T EVEN OWN A BIKE? YOU ARE BEING RIDICULOUS.” Hongjoong didn't realize that his hands were up in the air like he was being reprimanded. 

Mingi came down from the yelling contest, effectively giving Hongjoong whiplash as he sternly waved a finger in his face. “Don’t lie to me, I saw your location. Why were you at Park Seonghwa’s house for six hours, hm?”

Hongjoong opened his mouth to dismiss him, but something was definitely not right with what Mingi had just said. “How did you know that was Seonghwa's house?” 

“So you admit to it!” Mingi almost did a dance, if Hongjoong hadn’t held a palm up to pause. 

“Back up a second, how did you know that was Seonghwa’s house?” He asked one more time.

“Oh, well I was checking your location when you were doing the project with him.” Mingi said with a little too much tranquility. 

“Why were you checking my location?”

Mingi pouted. “Because I’m a good friend who worries about your safety. Bang buddy or not, you can never trust a man.”

Hongjoong groaned.

“Mingi, I’m not sleeping with Park Seonghwa.”

He wouldn’t even entertain the thought. Even just saying it out loud was absurd. Park Seonghwa was an anomaly to be figured out like a puzzle before Hongjoong could ever think about such sultry activities. 

“Six hours, Hongjoong.” Mingi was not convinced. 

“I—“ the words didn’t want to come.

His big secret. Out to the world. That was something Hongjoong didn’t want to happen just yet. The world wasn’t ready for the Park boys.

“So even _you’ve_ fallen for the campus prince’s charms, huh?” The taller smirked as if he actually caught Hongjoong red-handed.

“No, that’s not it.” The brunet shook his head.

“Then what is it?” Mingi cocked an eyebrow.

“I was…”

“You were…?”

Hongjoong’s brow furrowed. Big secret. Not ready to share. 

“You were making out with Park Seonghwa?”

“No— augh! Good Lord, Mingi—“

“Just tell me!” Mingi half laughed. 

“I was babysitting!!” Hongjoong exploded a bit more than he wanted to.

It was silent.

So much for secrets.

“Babysitting… Park Seonghwa?”

“No, geez, Mingi,” he buried his face in his hands. “I need you to keep this a secret.”

“Why?”

“Just— promise!”

“Uhh okay?”

Hongjoong couldn’t back out of it now, so he took a deep breath and grimaced.

“I was babysitting Park Seonghwa’s kid.”

“Park SeonGHWA’S—“ 

Hongjoong slapped a hand over Mingi’s mouth. “Shhh!! You promised!!” He whined up at the lanky man. 

Mingi gripped Hongjoong’s wrist and freed his mouth. “Park Seonghwa has a kid?!”

Hongjoongs other hand covered Mingi’s mouth.

Now thoroughly irritated, Mingi tore Hongjoong’s hands away from his face using his ‘tall man powers’. “We’re in our room, nobody else is here!” He whisper shouted in exasperation.

“We live in a dorm, I can hear it every time Minho sneezes in his room!!” Hongjoong shot back, gesturing to the wall behind the tv. “He doesn’t need to know about this, and neither does anyone else on this campus.”

Mingi’s jaw set. “Okay, but can I at least know why?”

Hongjoong paused. 

Was there actually a legitimate reason?

Yes. 

Was it valid?

As valid as keeping secrets was. 

“It- it’s not my place to go gossiping about someone’s personal life. If Seonghwa wanted the whole campus to know about his child, then we all would know.”

Mingi squinted. 

“That’s awfully noble of you, which is within character…”

Was Mingi _analyzing Hongjoong?_

It sure felt like it when the taller leaned in uncomfortably close to observe every pore on Hongjoong’s face. 

“You have a crush.” Mingi deduced.

Hongjoong sputtered. “W-what?”

“You,” Mingi pointed, “have a crush,” he grinned evilly, “on Park Seonghwa.”

“I heard you the first time, I mean what as in ‘what, are you insane?’ Which you obviously must be!”

Mingi ignored him and continued. “And that is why you do not want anyone to know,” he paced the living room. “Because you are a possessive gremlin that hoards shiny trinkets and pretty boys.”

“Seonghwa is not a pretty boy, Mingi. He’s a dad.”

“A pretty dad, then. You can’t deny that he’s objectively attractive. And you like him.”

“I do not!!”

“Yes you do. Don’t worry I won’t tell anyone.” Mingi smiled innocently.

“Okay, well that’s not the part I’m worried about. Just don’t mention the kid, okay? If you wanna prance around and declare my apparent love for Park Seonghwa all around campus, be my guest. Just leave his child out of it.”

He regretted that as soon as it came out of his mouth. 

Because the grin that molded Mingi’s face was sick and twisted, and looked a little too similar to the cartoon grinch. 

“Don’t make deals with the devil, Joong.”

Hongjoong snorted, immediately less intimidated. “You’re not the devil, Mingi. You’re a six-foot-dork biology major with back issues and glasses.”

“Yeah, and this six-foot-dork biology major is gonna tell the whole campus how you sucked face with Park Seonghwa—“

A pillow from the couch was launched full force at Mingi’s face, hitting him straight on with a loud ‘PAFF’.

“I did no such thing!”

“Okay, but you wanna.”

“I—“

“Don’t deny it.”

“I’ll break you glasses.”

“You’re not denying it~!”

“Natural selection is coming for you and your weak a** eyesight.”

“Hey— I don’t need 20/20 vision to see right through your shabby job at hiding your romantic interests.”

“Shut up.”

Mingi’s words from the night before would not leave Hongjoong’s mind, and it was quite aggravating, especially when he was on his way to dinosaur class, knowing he was about to meet Seonghwa there.

“Hongjoongie!!” A shriek cut through his thoughts and made him jump.

He groaned.

Kim Hongjoong didn’t have friends. He had parasites.

Parasite #1, also known as Jung Wooyoung, bounded down the campus sidewalk with only one intention; to be as intrusive as humanly possible.

Parasite #2, Choi San, was, thankfully, nowhere to be seen.

Hongjoong walked faster to run away, but Wooyoung slung an arm around his neck before he could. The short man sighed and lolled his head in defeat

“Yes?”

“A little birdie told me you’ve made friends with a certain Park Seonghwa,” Wooyoung drawled.

Hongjoong froze. Did Wooyoung know? Did Mingi tell him? 

He played it safe and rolled his eyes. Worst case scenario, Wooyoung would call him out for lying, unless he really didn’t know, in which case Hongjoong’s secret would be safe still. “We were partners for a project, that’s all.”

“I heard he also asked to sit with you the day after,” Wooyoung relentlessly pestered, admiring the nails of his free hand.

“So the man wanted to sit next to his project partner. Big deal.”

Wooyoung looked at the shorter, eyes wide and utterly abhorred. “He asked to sit with you.”

“Like any well mannered person should.”

“Park Seonghwa. The man who has permission to sit wherever he wants, asked to sit by you. 

“He has what?” Hongjoong wheezed.

Wooyoung withdrew his arm from around Hongjoong’s neck to cross both over his chest and pout as they walked. “You’re not reacting the right way!!”

“Reacting to Seonghwa socially interacting like a normal human, or to you acting like it’s some baffling concept?” Hongjoong snorted at the deepening of Wooyoung’s pout.

“Both!”

That warranted a laugh from the older.

“Kim Hongjoong!” Someone called.

Hongjoong searched around only to go rigid when he saw Park Seonghwa standing in front of the geology building, waving over at him.

Within half a second, Hongjoong had prayed to every deity known to man that Seonghwa hadn’t heard him speaking his name. He was talking at quite a casual volume, and voices carry farther than you think. 

Wooyoung blew a raspberry to suppress his shrill laugh that inevitably tumbled out of his mouth. 

Hongjoong waved back, and to his horror, Seonghwa waited by the front entrance instead of just walking in. He was waiting for Hongjoong.

“Good luck, lover boy!” Wooyoung wheezed and clapped Hongjoong on the back. 

Hongjoong swatted at the younger and grumbled as he left Wooyoung’s fit of giggles.

Nervousness swelled in the pit of his stomach with every step he took. When he realized this, he was absolutely dumbfounded. Since when did he get nervous around Park Seonghwa? At the beginning of the week, he wouldn’t have bat an eye at the man.

Maybe it was because Seonghwa’s attention was on him now. Maybe it was because Hongjoong now had found interest in figuring the man out, whereas before, he didn’t even care.

“I forgot to pay you.” Were the words that popped Hongjoong’s bubble of anxiety and let it fly away in the wind.

“Oh.” He said. Then he caught himself and shook his head. “No you didn’t.”

Seonghwa was confused. Mission complete. “Yes I did?”

“Nope!” Hongjoong beamed and sauntered past the taller man, into the doors of the geo building. 

The raven haired man scrambled to catch up to the brightly dressed Hongjoong. With his own usual dark clothing, he looked a stark contrast next to his new colorful friend.

A tall, brooding cup of black coffee and a sugar cookie coated in rainbow sprinkles fit the look of their aesthetic. 

“It doesn’t have to be much.” Seonghwa continued.

Hongjoong shrugged and kept walking. “It doesn’t have to be anything at all, either.”

“ _Please_ let me pay you,” Seonghwa nearly begged. “It’s all I can give to thank you.”

Hongjoong thought about that statement. Park Seonghwa, who supposedly (at least by Hongjoong’s observation) was struggling with money, only having money left to give? 

Sounds fake. 

The brunet man absolutely refused to be another financial burden. 

But something in Seonghwa’s eye told Hongjoong that he wasn’t going to back down. He sighed and stopped walking right outside of their classroom. 

“Fine, I’ll take a five.”

Seonghwa looked pensive.

Then he gave a nod and pulled his wallet out. Classic black leather. He passed a five over and swiftly shoved the wallet away.

Hongjoong went to fold the dollar bill in half, just to see that there were two fives in his hand. He gasped and looked back up, and Seonghwa raised his eyebrows in response.

“You accidentally gave me two,” Hongjoong began, and held one of the bills out to return. 

Then Seonghwa, dear Seonghwa, did something Hongjoong couldn’t have ever seen coming.

Seonghwa looked from the five dollar bill up to Hongjoong’s face, and his lips slowly pulled into a smirk. His chin tilted up as he looked down at the shorter boy.

“No, I didn’t.”

That had the same effect on Hongjoong as thirty lead bullets. It felt like he was upside down on a rollercoaster. His entire identity was in the middle of a realignment.

And Park Seonghwa had the audacity to stand there and watch Hongjoong short circuit. Not only that, but mirth crossed his dark eyes as he watched. 

One of Seonghwa’s eyebrows cocked, and he glanced over to the classroom. Hongjoong was still going through an astral shift when the taller mentioned that, “We should go, class is about to start.”

Hongjoong gulped. The nod he gave was weak, and Seonghwa either expected as much, or he didn’t even notice, because he just casually motioned for Hongjoong to follow him. Despicable.

Hongjoong, having no control over his own body anymore, muddled over to Seonghwa and followed him into the classroom like a zombie. He sat down next to the older, fitting the ten dollars in cash into his own brilliantly self-reformed wallet.

“That was a dirty trick.” He grumbled.

Seonghwa took one look at Hongjoong’s pout and let out a laugh. That pulled a lot of attention in their direction, and class hadn’t even started yet.

Their classmates apparently hadn’t gotten past his acquaintanceship with Park Seonghwa yet.

Frankly, neither had Hongjoong.


	7. A Big Deal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hongjoong agrees on a big big deal.

There were two things Hongjoong noticed about Seonghwa’s fidgeting during the lesson. 

First, it was what exactly the older had been fidgeting with. His keys. Or more, the accessories tied to his keys, which happened to be the bracelets Jisung and Hongjoong had made for him. 

Hongjoong was flattened by the fact that Seonghwa liked the bracelet of stars enough to clip it to his keychain, right next to the bracelet his son had made. 

Second, Hongjoong noticed that Seonghwa was fidgeting _nervously_. For what, Hongjoong had no idea, but it was pretty clear that the raven haired man was only half paying attention to the lecture (which was a shame, really, since duck billed dinosaurs were such an interesting concept).

“Are you okay?” Hongjoong nudged Seonghwa’s shoulder with his own, and mumbled his question over so only the other could hear.

The contact shocked Seonghwa out of his nervous fiddling, and he looked up to the younger with round eyes. “Oh, uh, yeah,” he blinked to fully come out of his daze before restating with a firmer “Yes.”

Hongjoong wasn’t convinced, and Seonghwa knew it clearly from the expression of the younger. He didn’t press his disbelief any further, though. Seonghwa had the right to keep his thoughts as his own.

So Hongjoong swerved the topic, eyes flicking to the keychain gripped in Seonghwa’s slender fingers.

“You put mine on there too.” 

Seonghwa chuckled, brows knitting incredulously. “Where else would I put it?”

“I don’t know,” Hongjoong shrugged and gave a little pressed smile. “I just didn’t think you’d put it on your keys.”

Seonghwa slowly looked from the man next to him to the bracelet in his hand. His voice grew particularly quiet and shy as answered. “I told you I like it.”

“Cause of the stars?” Hongjoong grinned. He was onto Seonghwa.

Seonghwa choked on embarrassment. “Yes,” his words were so small and strained.

Hongjoong had to keep his laughter in. Another bullet point was made after confirming his suspicions; Park Seonghwa liked stars.

“You’re quite adorable for being a grown man,” Hongjoong was filled with a certain fearlessness. Calling someone cute was never something to be ashamed of. It can be platonic just as easily as it could be romantic, which made it the perfect compliment.

Seonghwa had no idea how to respond to that. Yunho and Yeosang had given him loads of compliments. He was attractive, he was intimidating, he was thoughtful, he was sweet, the list went on and on.

But never had Seonghwa been told that he was adorable. Not since he was a child. So how was he supposed to react? He was left in the dark on it, and simply marinated in his own thoughts for the rest of the lecture. Hongjoong didn’t seem to mind that his compliment went unanswered. 

Thankfully, Hongjoong felt no need to receive thanks for his little praise he gave Seonghwa. When class was over, he saw fit to tend to another matter instead.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” He asked once more. Seonghwa hadn’t stopped anxiously looking at the time or spinning the little star beads in between his fingers, and Hongjoong couldn’t bring himself to let it go. 

Seonghwa sighed. He didn’t want to unload this issue to Hongjoong, worried he’d look like he was trying to guilt the latter into helping him. On the other hand, he did actually want Hongjoong’s help. It was selfish, Seonghwa knew, to try and bait his new friend, but he really believed that Hongjoong was a good match for babysitting Jisung. And if Seonghwa was being completely honest, It wouldn’t hurt to see the brunet more often. He really did enjoy Hongjoong and the company he offered.

Seonghwa took a breath. He had to prepare to not only ask, but to expect rejection. The worst it would do is send him on another babysitter hunt, so there was no real harm in asking. Hongjoong was still waiting patiently for the answer that was delayed, but inevitable.

Aware of the peeping eyes and ears that their classmates were directing toward him and Hongjoong, Seonghwa lowered his voice. “I still can’t find a babysitter for Jisung, and it’s getting harder for Yunho and Yeosang to find time when I actually need them to watch him.”

“Oh,” Hongjoong tilted his head and looked down at his notebook. In his own head, he fought with himself. He bit his tongue in thought, until he finally turned his eyes back to the upperclassman.

“What times do you need him to be watched, usually?”

Seonghwa bit his lip. Albeit he did it out of nerves, yet Hongjoong still nearly choked on his spit and had to force his eyes away and focus on another part of Seonghwa’s face. The man really was crafted by the gods, even Hongjoong would’ve been a fool to deny it. But that wasn’t the point. Stay focused, Hongjoong.

Yunho apparently was able to watch Jisung in the mornings when Seonghwa had class. It was when he had work where the problems arose.

When Seonghwa laid out that his shifts were noon to six on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and six to midnight on Fridays, Hongjoong raked the corners of his brain several times over. Each time he checked, he came up with the same conclusion; those were his free times. 

“Well,” Hongjoong started.

Oh boy. Here he goes. No turning back, Kim Hongjoong.

“I’m free during your shifts, so I guess I could watch him.”

Seonghwa’s eyes widened. It was optimal in his mind that Hongjoong agree to babysitting, but that didn’t mean he actually expected the man to offer. Guilt shot right through him. “I don’t want you to feel obligated, the one time was enough, and I don’t want to take up your free time either.”

“Well how about this? I’ll babysit until you can find a full time caretaker.” Hongjoong made a deal offer. 

Seonghwa pondered that for a moment, then a playful smile chased away his little frown. (Hongjoong will swear against it to the ends of the earth, but it kinda made him feel better when the man was smiling).

“You’d have to be okay with taking a regular payment.”

Hongjoong was absolutely not okay with it, but he wasn't going to clown himself by offering to babysit someone's child for free. Neither did he want to be siphoning money off of a man who could barely afford a home in shambles.

“I’d only be taking half your normal payment, so it’s fine by me.” Hongjoong bartered confidently.

Seonghwa was about to protest, but the appearance of two new entities coming through the door made his mouth clamp shut. Both men now realized that they had been all alone in the classroom.

“Hongjoong, what’s taking so long?” One of the newcomers complained. He had sharp eyes and a chiseled face, and Seonghwa couldn’t say he’d ever seen the man before. He recognized the other one, though. It was the man Hongjoong was talking to before class.

Hongjoong looked like he wanted to melt into the floor, and Seonghwa failed to keep back his little laugh. His eyes shot up to the two new faces once they made it over to the desk.

“Well hello,” the shorter one purred, eyes sweeping up and down Seonghwa’s form.

“Hi,” Seonhwa smiled politely. He knew he was regularly checked out by his classmates, so it was easy to brush the flirty introduction off. What threw him was how suddenly Hongjoong tensed.

“Wooyoung,” Hongjoong’s plea came in the form of a low warning. 

“I’m just saying hello, Joongie,” Wooyoung frowned in annoyance, only sparing Hongjoong half a glance before looking back at Seonghwa as if he was some kind of spectacle. 

Hongjoong rolled his eyes, not bothering to introduce his parasites, and returned his attention to Seonghwa so quickly it nearly knocked the older off his chair. “Anyway, I’m only taking half, not negotiable.” He ignored the look his two friends shared. “Do you have someone for today?” He tried his hardest to speak as cryptically as he could.

Thank everything good in the world that Seonghwa’s brain existed on the same wavelength that Hongjoong’s did, because he understood immediately. “I don’t yet actually.”

“Alright, then, I’ll be there.” Hongjoong wrapped up the conversation quickly, and hooked his arms around his taller friends’ necks to drag them out. Both Wooyoung and San complained, but the trio only got halfway across the classroom before Seonghwa called out Hongjoong’s name, effectively shutting them all up. The three of them turned back to look at the untouchable third year, Hongjoong out of curiosity, and the other two out of surprise.

“Thanks. I’ll see you later.” The raven haired man waved with a sweet smile. 

San and Wooyoung’s jaws dropped in unison, but Hongjoong just smiled back brightly. “Bye!” 

After that, Hongjoong dragged his friends out and sped down the sidewalk to the dorms. The two landed on either side of him, hooking their arms with him.

“Wow, Hongjoong. Best friends with the campus hottie already? didn’t know you were a big shot now!” San grinned his alligator grin.

“Yeah, what was all that about?” Wooyoung interrogated. “You didn’t have the decency to introduce us to Mr. Park Seonghwa, so the least you can do is share the tea with us.”

Oh no, Hongjoong would not be spilling the tea. No kind of tea was to be shared, no matter how steaming hot. The important tea? Absolutely not.

Though, there was some stale tea left to give.

He let out the biggest groan toward the sky, shook his head and gave in. Well, he pretended to, anyway.

“I’m friends with Park Seonghwa, yes. Best friends? No. He is in fact a living and breathing human, though. Not a concept. Definitely not a god like you guys pretend he is.” Hongjoong laid out for them. 

“I told you, he doesn’t react to things the right way!” Wooyoung exclaimed at San over Hongjoong’s head.

San hummed, then smugly tilted his head. “You talk like you’ve got Park all figured out, Joong.”

“His name is Seonghwa, first of all,” Hongjoong’s nose scrunched in distaste. “And no, for the record, I haven’t completely figured him out yet.”

Wooyoung widened his eyes and grinned. “So that means you have interest in him…” He drawled.

“I have interest in proving a point.” Hongjoong corrected.

“Mhm, What point?”

“I don’t think he’s as elusive as everyone thinks he is. Just misunderstood.”

Both of his friends let that simmer for a second.

“Not elusive, huh?” San nodded. 

Wooyoung scoffed. “As if. He didn’t even give me the time of day.”

“All you did was say hi very suggestively, and he said hello back to you very politely. If I was him, I would have smacked you without thinking twice, so you should be thankful he’s so patient and nice.”

Wooyoung shook his head. “The day you prove to me that Park Seonghwa isn’t actually the bad boy we are all convinced he is, will be the day I sign off my first born child to you.”

Hongjoong squinted. “Wooyoung.”

“Yeah?” 

“You’re male.”

“And?”

“You’re gay.”

“H*ll yeah I am.”

“You will not be having a first born child.”

Wooyoung paused.

San had to physically stop walking because he was laughing so hard. Wooyoung pouted and whined while San wheezed. Hongjoong just pinched the bridge of his nose.

“W-well I can adopt! A-and- and there is a surrogate option!” Wooyoung’s bottom lip jut out, and San immediately silenced his laughter to comfort his friend. 

While san draped himself over Wooyoung, Hongjoong sighed and patted the younger on the head as well. “Sorry, Woo.”

To be fair, he didn’t think Wooyoung would get so wound up about that, but it made sense that the man was sensitive in some aspect. Wooyoung was definitely a man who wanted a family some day, with a loving husband and children to cuddle and spoil. 

Aish, so much mindfulness of children lately. Hongjoong wondered if the universe was trying to tell him something.

If so, he consciously made the decision to ignore it.

He said goodbye to his beloved parasites and made his way home to panic about the deal he just made with Park Seonghwa. 

“What’s wrong, bro?” Mingi asked from his bed as he scrolled through twitter.

Hongjoong flopped onto his own bed. “Oh, you know. I just agreed to be a regular babysitter. The usual.”

Mingi burst into laughter. “Say psyche right now,” He clicked his phone off and sat up with the dumbest grin on his face.

“I wish I could, but I have to be at Park Seonghwa’s in-” Hongjoong checked his phone. “Uhh, two hours.”

The taller shook his head in disbelief. “This is the most wild thing to ever happen to you, my guy.” 

“I mean I agree, but why?”

“Because you’re a psych major with a full ride and now you’re employed by the man with the most widely known name on campus, just to watch his kid blow bubbles for a few hours.”

“Hmm,” Hongjoong hummed. “Bubbles. Jisung might like bubbles.”

Mingi snorted, then let a few moments of silence pass before speaking up again. “Also, is Seonghwa married or anything? Like he has a kid, but does he have a spouse?”

“No, no spouse mentioned, and his apartment is really small so I think it’s just him and Jisung.” Hongjoong stared up at the ceiling. “Oh, and you’re not allowed to talk to anyone about this. It’s secret secret.”

“But I have all the power to talk about your fat crush on this Jisung boy’s dad though, right?”

“Eh, Seonghwa’s okay.” Hongjoong shrugged, now deeming it appropriate to mess with Mingi. “I think his friend is really sexy though. Tall, big hands, totally my type.”

Mingi squinted behind his round framed glasses. “Park Seonghwa has friends?”

Ooh, Mingi chose the wrong thing to fixate on.

“HA,” Hongjoong huffed and guffawed. “That’s horrible, Song Mingi!”

“I didn’t mean it like that!” Mingi defended himself. “I just never see him with people. I never even heard stories of him talking casually to other people besides you.”

“Well he does have friends. At least two, besides me, and they both help him take care of his child, who I am now going to purchase some bubbles for because of you and your brilliant mind.”

Mingi knocked on his noggin. “Bio gets you big smarts like mine.”

Hongjoong grimaced. “It also gets you bad communication skills, apparently.”

“Good lord, can’t you just let me live for two minutes without hurting my feelings?” Mingi feigned hurt and splayed out on his mattress dramatically.

“Never,” Hongjoong beamed.


	8. Threats and Promises

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Hongjoong communicates predominantly in threats.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys!! Sorry it’s been such a long time, I got slammed with school :( but I’m back now, and made an extra long chapter to make up for it. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday!! And as always, than you so much for keeping up with the story 😭❤️

After a quick trip to the dollar store for some bubbles, Hongjoong arrived at Seonghwa’s house a few minutes early, as per request of Mr. Park. 

It was impossible for Hongjoong to ignore the little feeling of sparkles in his stomach when Seonghwa opened the front door and greeted him with a smile. Hongjoong told himself that it was normal. Who wouldn’t get butterflies just looking at Seonghwa’s smile? Or even just seeing his face? It was normal. Yes, it was normal.

He quieted his intrusive train of thought, having more important things to think about. Like bubbles. 

“Hey, thanks for coming early.” Seonghwa swung the door wide open and invited the younger into his home. 

“Yeah, of course!” Hongjoong hurried in with a smile of his own and was pleasantly surprised by little Jisung, who was toddling over from his supposed spot in the living room.

The baby fell against Hongjoong’s legs and let his head loll back to look up at the brunet. “Joong!!”

“Hello!” Hongjoong bent down to pat the boy’s head. 

Seonghwa watched his little boy with a fondness Hongjoong didn’t think he himself had ever felt before. Maybe watching Wooyoung learn how to lace his shoelaces into fun shapes on his sneakers came close. 

“Okay, so I’ll run through everything real quick.” Seonghwa closed the door and marched into the kitchen.

Hongjoong scooped Jisung up and followed closely. 

“I wrote out the schedule for every day on the whiteboard here, and everything you might need to know.”

The brunet scanned the board. Bright colored, neatly scribbled handwriting wrote out things like Jisung’s favorite shows, what to do if he’s crying, and how to handle misbehavior (Hongjoong was surprised by the fact that baby Jisung could ever misbehave).

The left side of the board had a table of schedules drawn out, and Hongjoong felt the need to take a picture. That was a little hard with a toddler fit snugly in his arms, so he just moved on. 

“Again, there’s food in the fridge, but don’t feel obligated to eat it. I’m just fine with you ordering takeout if you’re more comfortable with that,” Seonghwa gestured to the refrigerator that was littered with pages Jisung had colored from coloring books.

Hongjoong nodded. In his head, he knew he’d be ordering takeout. Like h*ll he’d let himself freeload off this poor man. 

Seonghwa then ran through the schedule for that particular day. Dinner at 6:30, nighttime routine at 7:00, bedtime by 7:30.

Hongjoong knew he’d be a master at handling this to-do list. It was just like Taehyung’s schedule for his own son, Hongjoong’s nephew.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t any time Hongjoong could take Jisung out to play with bubbles. Not today, at least, so he silently rescheduled ‘bubbles day’ for next time.

“If you need anything, just shoot me a text.” Seonghwa pulled the brunet out of his thoughts.

“Alright.” Hongjoong said, watching the older gather his things to leave before placing a kiss on his son’s head.

Seonghwa stood in the entryway, checking over his person one last time, and then glanced over at where Hongjoong was settling down on the floor with Jisung. 

“Hongjoong,” Seonghwa softly called. 

It was barely enough to catch his attention, and his head popped up curiously. “Yeah?”

The raven haired man smiled with such an endeared expression, Hongjoong felt like he was actually worth being adored as such. 

“Thank you. So much.”

“Y-yeah, no problem.” Hongjoong’s signature response to gratitude.

Seonghwa pursed his lips upon hearing it again, but he brushed the looming feeling off. “I’ll be back soon.”

“See you!” Hongjoong waved. 

Seonghwa gave his little boy one last look before stepping out.

Jisung swiveled to look at Hongjoong in nearing panic. “Appa go?”

Ah, how to approach this question coming from a clingy toddler??

Iseul was so independent, that he could be told his parents were at work without a fuss. But this was Park Jisung, not Kim Iseul. 

Hongjoong had a toolset, but he wasn’t sure how well it’d work.

“He’s going…” He created an air of suspense, holding his hands out dramatically. “On an adventure!”

Please work. Please no tears.

Please please please.

Jisung tilted his head with round eyes. “Ad.. a’venture?”

So far so good.

“Yep!” Hongjoong bobbed his head in one big nod. “And we have to see as many dinosaurs as we can before he gets back!”

Hongjoong knew that he made absolutely no sense, and any five year old would have deadpanned before declaring bs.

But Jisung was three. And he loved dinosaurs. So it was only natural that he lit up the way he did. Hongjoong thanked the universe for it, and began his fun little play date with arguably the most agreeable three-year-old he’d ever met.

First they played with blocks, then little plastic dinosaurs, all for about ten minutes before Jisung plopped the toys back into their basket and declared he wanted to do something else. Hongjoong obliged and suggested coloring again, which Jisung deemed worthy of doing with an adorably confident nod. Hongjoong put on a movie for background noise as they colored, and ended up getting sucked into it along with Jisung enough to forget all about the abandoned coloring book.

Bedtime snuck up on Hongjoong when he was cleaning up the remnants of dinner, and Jisung was on the kitchen floor where he could be supervised by the short adult. As he rinsed off Jisung’s little plastic bowl (He’d served up a meal for the boy using what was in Seonghwa’s kitchen and ordered takeout for himself), Hongjoong took another glance at the baby.

He was laying on his belly, propped up on his elbows as he flipped through the thick cardboard pages of his dinosaur book. Lele was sitting up beside him, patiently listening to every word Jisung babbled to him. 

Hongjoong smiled absently, and turned back to his task at hand when the clock on the stove caught his eye. The bright green 7:02 told him that it was time to begin the baby’s night time routine, so the brunet finished up drying off the bowl before going over the schedule on the whiteboard one more time. 

“Looks like it’s a bath, a story book, then bedtime,” Hongjoong muttered to himself, and turned to the boy who was pointing out the pictures in his book and discussing them with his stuffed dinosaur.

Hongjoong walked over and crouched right by him. Without even having to grab his attention, Jisung was looking up curiously at his babysitter. If Seonghwa hadn’t already noted that Jisung liked baths, Hongjoong would have had an incredibly hard time breaking it to the boy that playtime was over. 

“Alright, Jisung, I think it’s bath time,” He started.

“Ah!” Jisung cried in delight. “Bath time!” he jumped up and zipped into the bathroom, leaving his book and Lele where they were on the ground without a second thought.

“Woah, slow down!” Hongjoong grinned at the reaction and padded toward the bathroom, setting the book and doll on the kitchen counter as he went.

Inside the bathroom, Jisung already had his hands in a little basket filled with bath toys. Most of them were plastic dinosaurs. Hongjoong chuckled. As if Jisung would have it any other way.

“Do you like bath time, little Park?”

The child whipped his head around to look at Hongjoong. He nodded, eyes gleaming with enthusiasm.

Hongjoong laughed again, and let the little boy play with his dinosaurs while he figured out how to use the bathtub.

After a moment of discovery and experimentation, he got the gist of it and turned the water on. He dialed the faucet up to a warm temperature, tested it until it was just right for little Jisung, and then clogged the drain to let the tub fill up. 

“Perfect! Now, onto step two,” he spun around and helped Jisung stand up.

Jisung was very cooperative in letting Hongjoong take his clothes off, and plop him into the bathwater. He was completely unbothered by the brunet washing him, which Hongjoong had to guess was because he’d learned how to bathe a child without making them pause their playtime for longer than thirty seconds. 

“Look up, Jisungie!” Hongjoong said as he filled a cup with bathwater. When the boy tilted his head back, Hongjoong used his other hand to shield his little eyes from the water he poured on his head.

Then, once all the soap was washed off, and the shampoo rinsed out of Jisung’s hair, it was free playtime in the water again. Hongjoong participated in Jisung’s little game of dinosaurs, and ended up getting a little bit of bathwater on his hoodie purely from his own recklessness with the splashing. Really he didn’t mind, and continued to play with Jisung, carefully watching for when the pads of the boy’s soft fingers started to prune. That always determined that bathtime was over.

First, he cleaned up all of the toys that were in the bath and had them back in their basket by the tub. Hongjoong had the tub draining and the bathroom put back together in no time. Held tightly in his arms was a giggling bundle of Park Jisung, nicely wrapped up in a towel. With wide, swooping motions, Hongjoong swung the shrieking boy all the way into the nursery.

The man was fitting pajamas onto Jisung, picked out by the boy himself with his exquisite taste, when he witnessed the first yawn of that night. A little smile wriggled its way onto his face as he helped the boy needle his arms through his flannel pajama top.

“Tired, Ji?”

The boy shook his head to deny it, “No, still play.”

Hongjoong hummed with a content smile as he finished with the last button, and sat the boy comfortably on his hip. 

“Okay, well let’s clean up before we play again. Your Appa likes it clean, right?”

To prove just how not-sleepy he was, Jisung gave a strong nod, and a “yes.”

With a chuckle, Hongjoong strolled into the open floor plan of the rest of the apartment. Without having to think hard about it, he swiped Lele from where he left him on the counter, and returned him to Jisung’s grasp.

He began to tidy up by himself with his only available arm, letting the boy cling to him and holding him steady with his other arm. This seemed to work the last time, so Hongjoong put all of his hopes on the ideal that the rhythm of his steps and the mundanity of his tasks would tire Jisung once again.

While he was putting the coloring items away, a little cheek found its way to his shoulder, and he closed the kitchen cupboard before checking on the baby who was being pulled further and further into dreamland. He held in a sigh of relief. His plan was working.

“Are you tired now?” He asked gently.

When the “no” he received came with glassy eyes and a sad look, he frowned. Jisung was tired, but he didn’t want to be, and he was really fighting it. Hongjoong realized that putting Jisung to sleep would not be as easy as it was last time, but that was fine by him. He would figure it out.

“Let’s read a book then.” Hongjoong decided, and walked back into the nursery to settle into the old rocking chair in the corner. He looked over a few of the nearby books until a little voice put a stop to his plans.

“Sing, please?” Jisung asked, not quite pronouncing the “L” as clearly as he usually tried to. 

After getting over the adorableness of the request, Hongjoong processed the content of it. He never had to sing to Iseul, but he remembered the first time he watched Jisung and Seonghwa had mentioned singing at bedtime if reading a book wasn’t enough. That time, Jisung was tired enough to just knock out on his own without even needing a story.

Hongjoong thought that he wouldn’t get to the point where stories wouldn’t be enough to get the boy sleepy, but the situation he currently was in went way beyond that. He didn’t expect Jisung to flat out ask him to sing.

He bit his lip as his thoughts swallowed him.

He wasn’t a horrible singer by any means, and he knew he could do more than just carry a tune. But at the same time, he was far from phenomenal, and he certainly didn’t think his voice was very fitting for lullabies. What difference would it make to Jisung? Hongjoong tried to reason with his sudden nervousness.

_All of the difference, if Seonghwa had an angelic voice._

Of course, Hongjoong had no way of knowing what Seonghwa’s singing voice was like, so the nervousness was pointless. What it was was what it would be, and there was nothing Hongjoong could do about it, so why worry so much?

One glance down at the boy reminded him that he was taking a little too long to answer. 

“You want me to sing?” Despite already knowing the answer, he couldn’t help himself from asking for clarification.

Too sleepy to make any more words, Jisung nodded and rubbed his eye with a fist.

It only took a few seconds for Hongjoong to cave. “Okay, I’ll sing,” he began rocking the chair to lull the baby the rest of the way to sleep.

Then the thoughts began again. What would he even sing? What lullabies did he know? Did Jisung like a specific song? Oh, that last one was the least relevant at the moment. The boy would express dislike if it came to that.

Hongjoong was a musical person. He loved every part of music; consuming, creating, composition, all of it. He even considered a major in music, but it just didn’t end up happening. Even so, music was arguably one of his biggest passions, and his taste was nearly endless. He had a lot of songs stored up in his noggin, surely he could find something to pass as a lullaby.

“Let me think,” He drawled playfully to fill the silence as he thought.

The pop and coffeehouse songs that he thought of didn’t quite seem adequate for a lullaby. He thought back to his soundtrack phase, and scrolled through his list of recent movies for something soft and gentle.

The memory of watching a movie with his nephew floated into his head. It was a sequel about an ice queen and spirits and what not, and as usual when watching a new movie, Hongjoong fell in love with the music score. Most of the wordless songs in the soundtrack made it to his playlists. But it was not one of these songs that came to his mind at this time, no.

His nephew had also taken a liking to the music. Understandably, like every child that watched the movie, Iseul was absolutely obsessed with the songs, and insisted upon listening to them on repeat every single day for at least two weeks straight. It only took one day of babysitting his nephew for Hongjoong to have the lyrics to all of the character-sung songs memorized by heart.

One of which, he remembered, was a lullaby, sung by a mother at the beginning of the movie. It was actually one of the only lyrical songs from that movie that he enjoyed enough to add to one of his playlists.

Hongjoong knew he was extremely lucky in this moment to have not only the melody memorized, but the words as well.

“Okay,” He said more to himself than to the boy who was waiting in his lap. Hongjoong adjusted Jisung so he was cradled in his arms and held comfortably up against his chest. He had no idea what Seonghwa’s exact routine was, but this seemed right to him.

He took one deep breath to expel all of his apprehension, and then began to sing. His voice was wobbly and unsure at first, but when Jisung let out a sigh and snuggled into Hongjoong’s chest, the man relaxed as well. His voice evened out, and he gently rocked the chair as he sang.

His voice wasn’t built for lullabies, but it seemed to do the trick well enough. Jisung’s eyes were struggling to stay open, and they eventually fluttered closed by the second verse. Hongjoong finished out the song just to make sure the boy had really fallen asleep, and being in no rush, rocked silently in the chair for a few minutes after.

Jisung’s little breaths had evened out, and he didn’t budge and inch when Hongjoong stood up. He was carefully lowered into his crib by gentle hands, and remained asleep as soundless steps made their way out of his nursery. 

Hongjoong released a breath as he closed the door. The apartment was silent, and he let himself sit in the peace of it for a few moments. His gaze traveled from the kitchen, over the living room, and landed in the dining room. 

What next? 

Jisung was tucked into bed with his Lele, everything was neat and tidy, and Hongjoong had taken care of every other bullet point on the Friday schedule. The whiteboard didn’t specify what to do after this, so he felt a little lost.

All he really could do was sit on the couch and wait for Seonghwa to get home. That’s exactly what he decided to do, since nothing else came to mind. 

He left the tv off, and checked his phone as he made himself comfortable on the couch. It was almost 8:00, which meant there were still four more hours to go until Seonghwa came back.

His first task was to fill Seonghwa in on the status of his home and son, which only took a few minutes. After sending the message off, he pulled down his notification wall.

A string of recent messages from Mingi were congesting his notifications, and he snorted quietly at the sight.

_How’s the babysitting going?_

_Did you get bubbles?_

_Does he like the bubbles?_

_If he does that means I’m prime uncle material._

_Your kids will love me. I’ll be known as the fun uncle._

_San and Woo don’t stand a chance 😎_

Idk, Jongho might be a contender

_That’s not fair, he’s good at everything 😫😫_

Your words, not mine

🗿🗿🗿

_Also, why are you texting me? Don’t you have a baby to watch?_

I just put him to sleep, I’m not an idiot

And why are YOU texting me

?

Don’t you have a rumor to spread

🙄🙄?

The audacity smh

_Oh so you want me to start spreading rumors now, huh? 😏😏_

_Is it so word can get back to your Prince Charming? And he’ll get the idea to sweep you off your tiny feet?_

Mingi i'll castrate you

_HHHH_

_You have the phattest crush lol_

it’s not a threat it’s a promise, Song Mingi

_ASFJJGFAADFHH_

_STOP GETTING DEFENSIVE_

_IM TEASING YOU  
read✔️_

_PLEASE DON’T CASTRATE ME  
read✔️_

_HONGJOONG  
read✔️_

Hongjoong giggled evilly to himself and clicked his phone off. After a bit of debate, he decided to binge a drama on low volume until Midnight. Due to the nature of such dramas, he was only into the fourth episode when he heard the door unlock. 

Panic spiked in him, and he jumped up to fight off the intruder. He calmed once he realized it was the owner of the house, and not some psycho coming to baby-nap little Park.

“Hey,” Seonghwa said with a smile as he closed the front door. 

“Hi.” Hongjoong replied.

Seonghwa would’ve continued, but he was thoroughly distracted the moment he actually looked around.

The raven haired man walked into his home, eyes soaking in the state of the living room. It was just as clean as (if not more clean than) when he’d come home on days it was Yunho or Yeosang babysitting. Seonghwa was pleasantly surprised.

He had braced himself for a bit of a mess, knowing Hongjoong to be a man of creative spontaneity. Even just a day ago, Seonghwa had come home to a well contained mess of beads and string on his dining table, which was totally within Hongjoong’s character. So as he looked over his clean home, a stark contrast to what he’d been expecting, he couldn’t help but be impressed by the man who was standing in the middle of his living room.

Speaking of whom, Hongjoong looked nervous, and even a little uncomfortable as he stood silent and awkward.

 _oops,_ Seonghwa realized he must have been wearing a very critical expression, and brought back a smile to ease the tension he’d accidentally created.

“Has he woken up at all?” Seonghwa draped his jacket over the back of the couch, and was relieved to see Hongjoong snap out of his frozen terror. 

“No, he’s been asleep the whole time.” The brunet responded, finally catching up to casual conversation.

“Oh,” the older’s eyebrows raised. “That doesn’t happen very often.”

Hongjoong blinked. “It doesn’t?”

“No,” Seonghwa shook his head, “You got lucky.” He grinned playfully as if he knew something Hongjoong didn’t. “Thanks for keeping it clean, by the way!” He quietly lilted and walked into the kitchen.

Hongjoong followed right behind him, still surprised. “No yeah, of course.”

Seonghwa hummed as he opened the refrigerator. “What’d you guys have for dinner?”

“Oh, I heated up the rest of the leftover stew for Jisung, and ordered takeout for myself.” He leaned his hip against the counter and folded his arms. 

A puzzled look flashed across Seonghwa’s features when he closed the fridge and turned to Hongjoong with a chilled tupperware in his hand. “That’s silly, why’d you go through the effort of doing both?”

“Well I wanted to give Jisung something nutritious, and…” He faltered. Hongjoong had been confident in his logic in the moment, but now being called silly by Park Seonghwa really made him feel silly.

Seonghwa chuckled at the younger’s distress. “I didn’t mean it like that. I just want you to know you don’t have to do that every time.” As he spoke, he set the tupperware on the counter and clicked the top off, before setting it in the microwave. “If you want takeout, that’s just fine, but you don’t have to go through the hassle to get Jisung a ‘super nutritious dinner’. He likes chicken nuggets just as much as the next kid, and as long as he eats, I’m happy.” He shrugged, and spared Hongjoong a glance, turning his head away from the microwave. 

Hongjoong looked up and attentively met his gaze.

“And you know you can eat anything that I have in my kitchen, too. You don’t have to break the bank ordering takeout every time you’re here.” He paused the microwave a second before it beeped so it wouldn’t disrupt his sleeping baby.

“I know,” Hongjoong said quite absently as he absorbed the information. He really didn’t like the idea of eating Seonghwa’s money. He also didn’t want to reduce himself to eating fast food three days out of the week, much less subject Jisung to that as well. He’d have to find a good middle ground.

But now was not the time for that, as Seonghwa was leaning back against the counter across from Hongjoong so they could talk face-to-face. “Anyway, let’s talk about payment.”

Hongjoong released a theatrical sigh and slumped dramatically, making Seonghwa laugh in light amusement.

“You’re not getting out of it, Hongjoong.” 

“Can’t I?”

“No.” Seonghwa shook his head, smile still present.

Hongjoong’s hand rubbed at the back of his neck, and his nose scrunched in displeasure. “Well pitch your price, then.”

“I paid my last babysitter fifteen per hour,” Seonghwa started, but paused when he noticed Hongjoong’s ‘calculation’ face. He took the opportunity to take a bit of his food while he waited.

After doing the math, Hongjoong’s jaw dropped. That was almost 100 per day, and that was just with Hongjoong’s part-time hours. Seonghwa’s old babysitter was a full time babysitter. Just how much money had Seonghwa paid this guy?

“Absolutely not,” the words came out of his mouth before he could think about it, not that he would’ve said it any differently. “No way I’m charging that much.”

Seonghwa swallowed. “How much, then?”

“Five.” He answered definitively. 

The taller snorted, and echoed what Hongjoong had said, “Absolutely not.”

“Well I’m not taking fifteen.”

“Alright, then, ten.”

Hongjoong frowned, still unsatisfied. “Six.”

Seonghwa furrowed his brow. “Ten.”

“Six.” Hongjoong stood his ground, and Seonghwa could sense he was very adamant.

Seonghwa pursed his lips as he took a moment to think about how to appease the stubborn brunet.

“Eight,” the raven haired man finally offered. “I will not go any lower.”

Hongjoong paused to calculate. That’d be 48 a day. He mulled it over once, and then twice.

Seonghwa waited patiently, chewing away at his leftovers.

Eventually, with a discontented sigh, Hongjoong caved. “Eight’s fine.”

Seonghwa’s face lit up, and he pushed himself off of the counter, holding his tupperware out. He plopped the container right into Hongjoong’s hands, saying “Eat some!” before disappearing into his bedroom.

He’d insisted with such an energy that Hongjoong obeyed mindlessly. He was already a few bites in when he realized that he was actually eating Seonghwa’s dinner, and then it struck him just how hungry he was. He only allowed himself one more bite, absolutely refusing to finish the rest of it. It was Seonghwa’s meal, and Hongjoong already had dinner. He’d get something to munch on later.

Seonghwa returned with a little bundle of cash. “Here you go.”

Begrudgingly, Hongjoong pocketed the 48 dollars, and laughed dryly at Seonghwa’s satisfied smile. He pushed the tupperware toward the older. “Thanks.”

“Oh, you can have the rest of it,” Seonghwa kindly insisted. He didn’t say anything, but he had a feeling Hongjoong was hungry, and he’d be damned to let a guest-- or rather, a friend, be hungry in his home. 

Hongjoong let out an incredulous scoff. “If I’m going to take your money, you’re going to finish your dinner.” after depositing the food back into Seonghwa’s hands, he folded his arms expectantly. 

Seonghwa looked like he was fighting his inner caretaker, and that’s exactly what he was doing. “Are you sure you don’t want anything?” He looked up with round eyes.

That made Hongjoong chuckle. “Seonghwa,” He chided, “Eat. It’s okay.”

The older chewed his lip, then huffed out the smallest laugh. Under Hongjoong’s hawk-like gaze, he scarfed down the rest of his dinner, partially glad that Hongjoong made him do so. He hadn’t eaten since before his shift.

While Seonghwa rinsed the container out, Hongjoong sunk back into the recesses of his own mind. Another bullet point was added to the List of Park Seonghwa.

The man was kind to a fault.


End file.
